Mila, the wholesale arm of Siminn, the Icelandic incumbent, has made some changes to their digital leased lines prices. The main changes are that the tariffs for lower bandwidths lines have increased, whereas tariffs for higher bandwidths lines have been decreased. Furthermore, new term discounts have been introduced where customers who sign up for 3 years get a 15% discount on monthly rental, 2 year contract gives 10% discount and 1 year discount gives 5% discount.

Details of the tariff changes can be found in T-Basket Fixed and Mobile Voice. Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its quarterly updates of T-Basket Fixed and Mobile Voice http://sa-link.cc/TBasketFixedandMobileVoice

T-Mobile has introduced two new tariffs to its postpaid customers. Both plans give unlimited calls. At CZK 2000, T-Moble Grand offers CZK 1000 credit plus unlimited calls to T-Mobile and fixed lines. Grand Plus is charged at CZK 3990 per month and allows users to make unlimited calls to any network in the Czech Republic. Messaging is not included in the tariff so is still charged at individual prices.

T-Mobile continues to offer its previous pay monthly plans such as Friends, Top and Credit.

In addition, the operator has unveiled a prepay plan with an emphasis on data. Twist Internet requires a monthly fee of CZK 850, for which users receive a credit of CZ K50 for calls and text messages as well as 5GB of data per month. This tariff offers a price of CZK 7.90 per minute for calls to fixed lines and other operators. Calls to T-Mobile are cheaper and two time bands apply, with off-peak on-net calls costing CZK 3.40 per minute.

Full details of the plans above are available in T-Cellular Online. Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its continuous updates of T-Cellular Online http://sa-link.cc/3i

T-Mobile Austria has introduced the a new plan Hit Germany, the plan is aimed at users who contact Germany frequently and is also available as a SIM only.

* Denotes roaming minutes.

Orange Austria also offers a very similar plan with more roaming minutes included but fewer SMS included.

Mobile operators are increasingly offering reduced international rates as an option or as an integral part of a tariff, as shown in the table above. As in the case of these tariffs, they can be based on international traffic between two closely linked countries such as Germany and Austria, or else based on the user's ethnicity. Similarly, many operators in Germany offer packages for reduced calls and texts to Turkey and French operators have similar offers to users originating from Northern Africa.

These tariffs have been extracted directly from our T-Cellular Online Service (TCO).

Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its monthly updates of T-Cellular Online http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=navigationheader&a0=1530&a1=0

The Norwegian incumbent, Telenor, has launched iPad tariffs for both residential and business customers.

For residential customers there are two options

VAT at 25% is included.

However, business customers have three options.

VAT is excluded.

*Customers pay for the actual usage but never more than NOK 40 per day.

There is no minimum contract length on these tariffs. Furthermore, customers receive free access to Telenor’s over 330 hotspots.

Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its quarterly updates of the T-Wireless Service

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Jóhanna Helgadóttir – Senior Consultant – jhelgadottir@strategyanalytics.com

3 Austria is going to start selling iPhone 4 on 29th November and will then launch its 3 Superphone tariffs for iPhone 4. Customers can start registering their interest as off 25^th November.

Please see details of the 3Superphone tariffs; 36 and 24 months minimum contract respectively and VAT at 20% included.

*Unlimited data up to 5GB after that speed is reduced to 64kbit/s.

*Unlimited data up to 5GB after that speed is reduced to 64kbit/s.

As well as the features above 3Superphone tariffs subscribers will also have access to over 40 mobile TV channels, Planet3 the Mobile portal of 3 Austria and the push email service 3MoreMail.

Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its monthly updates of T-Cellular Online http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=navigationheader&a0=1530&a1=0

Jóhanna Helgadóttir – Senior Consultant – jhelgadottir@strategyanalytics.com

The US telecoms giant is now offering the fastest mass-market fibre optics service (FiOS) broadband package. The new service delivers download speeds of 150Mbit/s and upload speeds of 35Mbit/s. This is easily the fastest FiOS offering in the market with the previous fastest offering being at 50Mbit/s download and 20Mbit/s upload.

Verizon is offering the new fast service to most of the 12.5 million homes that the FiOS network passes. The operator is also planning to launch a SME offering for the 150M/35M service in December of this year; however there are no prices available yet for the SME service.

Please see details of the Verizon offer below:

• FiOS Internet with Voice service $194.95 – 12 months contract
• FiOS Internet with Voice service $209.99 – no minimum contract
• FiOS Internet without Voice service $199.99 – 12 months contract
• FiOS Internet without Voice service $214.99 – no minimum contract

Verizon also charges an activation charge of $49.99 and customers who opt for no minimum contract are charged an installation fee of $79.99

With the monthly rentals for the new services being so steep it is not likely that residential customers will be running to the shops trying to get this service. But they need not fret as Verizon is still maintaining its other FiOS Internet lower speed services of 50M/20M, 25M/25M and 15M/5M.

Verizon will maintain its other FiOS Internet tiers of 50/20, 25/25 and 15/5 Mbps. FiOS Internet packages of 35/35 Mbps, 25/25 Mbps and 15/5 Mbps will continue to be available in double-, triple- and quadruple-play bundles with FiOS TV, FiOS Digital Voice and/or Verizon Wireless service.

However, the question is how long to wait until Verizon’s competitor’s increase the speed of their services, bringing down the monthly rental with increased competition?

Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its quarterly updates of T-Connect http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=NavigationHeader&a0=1562

Jóhanna Helgadóttir – Senior Consultant – jhelgadottir@strategyanalytics.com

The Greek mobile operator has made substantial changes to its post paid offerings. As a part of this revamp a new range of tariffs, Cosmote Unlimited, has been launched.

Please see the table below for full details of each offer: prices include VAT at 23%.

* SMS to all national networks.

The new tariff plans have integrated into the Cosmote Family Package, offering subscribers a reduction of up to EUR 20 per month. Cosmote is promoting the new tariffs with a campaign called ‘Maniates’ and the slogan is ‘Gain the most by joining the largest community’.

Furthermore, the Cosmote Unlimited with Internet range of tariffs has been revamped. Please see table below for full details: prices include VAT at 23%.

With this new offer Cosmote is strengthening its customers base and with that its strong position in the Greek mobile market. However, earlier this month the Greek telecoms regulator EETT, slapped heavy fines on the three main operators for failing to inform their customers about increases to charges for minimum talk time. Cosmote and Vodafone Hellas have been charged with a fine of EUR 2 million and Wind Hellas with a fine of EUR 1 million.

The Greek mobile market is struggling. It has been predicted that there will be a loss of about 20% of the market’s revenue, which will add on top of the 10% loss off market revenue in 2009. Furthermore, the operators have been locked in a price war for customers and on top of that with the current economic climate mobile use has fallen significantly along with average revenue per user.

What will now be the response from Cosmote’s other two main rivals? Importantly will they be able match and better these offers by Cosmote and hopefully increase mobile usage again?

Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its monthly updates of T-Cellular Online http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=navigationheader&a0=1530&a1=0

Jóhanna Helgadóttir – Senior Consultant – jhelgadottir@strategyanalytics.com

The Swiss incumbent has launched three new tripleplay Vivo Casa packages that include Swisscom TV, broadband internet and fixed telephony. Minimum contract length is 12 months.

The packages are as follows:

* Available with fibre optics

Prices include VAT.

Basic and Comfort customers have the option to add an International option at CHF 9 per month, which includes up to 500 free evening and weekend minutes for calls to the EU countries, Liechtenstein and North America. This is already included in the Top package.

For convenience the copyright charges of CHF 2.25 per month have been included in the monthly rental. Furthermore, new Swisscom TV customers receive the first 4 months for free.

The Vivo Casa tariffs replace the very successful Casa Trio packages. Now will Swiss customers be tickled by this new offer and keep up with the success of the Casa Trio offer?

Teligen Tariff and Benchmarking Service monitors price developments and changes in the T-Services range

http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=navigationheader&a0=202&a1=0

Jóhanna Helgadóttir – Senior Consultant – jhelgadottir@strategyanalytics.com

The retail giant Tesco has launched a low cost international calling card. The card can be used from both mobiles and landlines and offers cheaper rates to both services.

Rates are as cheap as 2p per minute to a landline to the EU countries, China and India to name a few. Customers calling a mobile in India and China will only pay 2p per minute and mobile calls to the EU countries start at 6p per minute. There is a connection call of 4p per call.

Tesco is following in the footsteps of services such as Telediscount that offers cheap rates for both fixed and mobile calls.

Will this move by Tesco spur any of the other UK operators, fixed and mobile, into action? We wonder, according to a research by Simplifydigital, UK consumers do not shop around for the cheapest international call rates and waste millions of pounds each year on these calls. Another pertinent question is of course will this spur consumers into action?

Teligen Tariff and Benchmarking Service monitors price developments and changes in the T-Services range

http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=navigationheader&a0=202&a1=0

Jóhanna Helgadóttir – Senior Consultant – jhelgadottir@strategyanalytics.com

Today Ofcom announced that charges that consumers face for leaving their landline phone contracts early will be cut by as much as 85%.

Over the past year and half, Ofcom has been working with BT, TalkTalk and Virgin Media, UK’s three biggest landline providers, to reduce the cost that customers incur when terminating their contract early (early termination fee). Ofcom wants the early termination fee to reflect the costs that the providers save by no longer providing the service. Cheaper early termination fees will also apply to customers who take out broadband in the same package. The providers have different costs to account for therefore, the charges will vary between providers.

Early termination charges for popular packages*

* Table from Ofcom press release

· TalkTalk introduced its new charges on 1^st June 2010 (except for Tiscali, where charges will change on 1^st November 2010)

· Virgin Media will introduce the new charges in August

· BT will introduce the charges in October 2010

Ofcom is not going to stop here, other landline providers are expected to follow suits and reduce their early termination fees.

Ofcom claims that it is working on applying the same principal on other areas of communication. Broadband as a part of a PSTN contract falls under this agreement. However, customers taking out a broadband connection separate from their PSTN contract will not benefit.

Also when will Ofcom start working with the mobile operators to cut early termination fees? When and if that happens what will the implications on the handset subsidies that UK mobile customers already get from the operators?

Teligen monitors price developments of this sort in its monthly updates of T-World Fixed http://www.strategyanalytics.com/default.aspx?mod=NavigationHeader&a0=202&a1=0

Jóhanna Helgadóttir – Senior Consultant – jhelgadottir@strategyanalytics.com