T-Mobile (brand)
| T-Mobile International Logo, 2007-present | |
| Company type | Subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom |
|---|---|
| Industry | Wireless Services |
| Founded | 1990 |
| Headquarters | Bonn, Germany |
Key people | Hamid Akhavan – CEO Katharina Hollender – CFO |
| Products | HSDPA, UMTS, W-CDMA, EDGE, GPRS, GSM |
| Website | www.tmobile.net |
T-Mobile is a German mobile network operator headquartered in Bonn, Germany. It is a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom and belongs to the FreeMove alliance.
Overview
T-Mobile is a group of mobile phone corporate subsidiaries (all under the ownership of Deutsche Telekom) that operate GSM and UMTS networks in Europe and the United States. The "T" stands for "Telekom." Most subsidiaries of Deutsche Telekom have names beginning with "T-". T-Mobile also has financial stakes in mobile operators in Eastern Europe. Globally, T-Mobile has 101 million subscribers, making it the world's sixth largest mobile phone service provider by subscribers and the third largest multinational after the United Kingdom's Vodafone and Spain's Telefonica.
T-Mobile International has a substantial presence in eleven European countries: Austria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, the Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro, the Netherlands, Poland, Slovakia and the United Kingdom as well as in the United States.
Deutsche Telekom recently attempted to acquire rival mobile network operator O2, but it was eventually acquired by Spain's Telefonica.
As well as kit sponsors for FC Bayern Munich, Ferencvárosi TC and West Bromwich Albion, T-Mobile is also a sponsor of several sports events, some of which carry the company name. For example, it sponsors its own cycling team, the T-Mobile Team, and the Austrian first division football competition, the T-Mobile Bundesliga. It was also the official global mobile phone carrier for the 2006 FIFA World Cup (football) in Germany.
Germany
In Germany, its home market, T-Mobile is the largest mobile phone operator with 32 million subscribers (as of September 2005), closely followed by its primary rival Vodafone. The highly profitable GSM network in Germany is scheduled to be supplemented and ultimately replaced by UMTS, for which T-Mobile spent €8.2 billion in August 2000 to acquire one of the six licenses for Germany.
On July 1, 1989, West Germany's state-owned postal monopoly, Deutsche Bundespost (DBP) was reorganized, with telecommunications consolidated in a new Deutsche Bundespost Telekom unit; this was renamed Deutsche Telekom in 1995, and began to be privatized in 1996.
The analog first-generation C-Netz ("C Network," marketed as C-Tel) was Germany's first true mobile phone network (the A and B networks, also owned by the post office, had been previous radiotelephone systems), and was introduced in 1985. Following German reunification in 1990, it was extended to the former East Germany.
On July 1, 1992, the Deutsche Bundespost Telekom began to operate Germany's first GSM network as its DeTeMobil subsidiary. The GSM 900-MHz frequency band was referred to as the "D-Netz," and Telekom named its service D1; the private consortium awarded the second license (now Vodafone) chose the equally imaginative name "D2." In 1996, as Deutsche Telekom began to brand its subsidiaries with the "T-" prefix, the network was renamed T-D1 and DeTeMobil became T-Mobil; the C-Netz, in the process of being wound down, was not rebranded, and was shut down in 2000. In 2002, as Deutsche Telekom consolidated its international operations, it anglicized the T-Mobil name as T-Mobile, although sometimes also using the name "T-D1" within Germany. (It is still common to hear Germans refer to T-Mobile and Vodafone as "D1" and "D2.")
D1 introduced SMS services in 1994 and began a prepaid service, Xtra, in 1997.
Hungary
In May 2004, the same day when Hungary joined to the European Union, the former company, named Westel (which was owned entirely by the former Matáv) changed its name, and the entire marketing. Westel was the most popular cellphone network in Hungary at the time. The company was called T-Mobile Hungary, but after some financial decisions, with the other T- companies, it formed to Magyar Telekom Nyrt. Mobil Szolgáltatások Üzletág (Hungarian Telekom, Mobile Services Business Unit), but they still say T-Mobile. At overall, T-mobile has the best cellphone coverage in Hungary, and they also provide high-speed services, like EDGE, 3G, and HSDPA in the major cities of Hungary, and in the area of the biggest Hungarian truistic goal, Lake Balaton.
Croatia
T-Mobile entered the Croatian market in October 1999 when Deutsche Telekom initially acquired a 35 percent interest in Hrvatski telekom, including its cell phone service provider Cronet. Two years later DT signed an agreement with the Croatian government to acquire the additional 16 percent needed for a majority holding. In January 2003, Hrvatski telekom assembled all of its mobile activities under a single brand HTmobile. Finally, in October 2004, HTmobile became T-Mobile Hrvatska i.e. T-Mobile Croatia, thus joining the global T-Mobile family also by name.
Czech Republic
T-Mobile was previously known as Paegas in the Czech Republic.
T-Mobile Czech Republic a.s. has been operating in the Czech market since 1996. As of 30 June 2006, 4.734 million customers were using T-Mobile services.
T-Mobile Czech Republic a.s. operates a public mobile communications network on the GSM standard in the 900 and 1800 MHz bands and is also authorized to operate a UMTS network. T-Mobile was the first operator in the Czech Republic to launch this third-generation technology on 19 October 2005 under the name Internet 4G.
Montenegro
T-Mobile brand entered the Montenegrin market in 2006. T-Mobile Montenegro (T-Mobile Crna Gora) is completely owned by T-Crnogorski Telekom, which is itself owned by Magyar Telekom, a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom. Although acquisition by Magyar Telekom was done in 2005, it was not until September 26, 2006 when MoNet GSM operator was renamed to T-Mobile Montenegro.
MoNet GSM launched on 1 July, 2000, as part of Telecom Montenegro. It became an independent incorporated limited liability company a month later, on August 1, 2000.
Today's T-Mobile signal covers 99% of Montenegro's inhabited territory. T-Mobile has 188 active base transceiver stations, which cover all urban and suburban areas, major highway routes, and tourist centers. T-Mobile has roaming agreements with 172 GSM and 32 GPRS providers.
The company that currently holds around 40% of the Montenegrin Market of Mobile Telephony uses GSM 900, GPRS, and EDGE technologies. EDGE technology brings T-Mobile Montenegro 1 step towards providing UMTS, the 3G successor to GSM. EDGE is available in 14 municipalities in Montenegro as of July 1, 2005.
Poland
T-Mobile is involved in an ownership dispute with Vivendi for Polska Telefonia Cyfrowa S.A., operator of the Era GSM network. T-Mobile owns 49 percent of the company directly, with the remaining 51 percent owned by a consortium of Vivendi and the bankrupt Polish conglomerate Elektrim. In 2006, T-Mobile reached an agreement with Elektrim to buy most of the remaining shares, but Vivendi filed suit in the United States to block the move.[1] Should T-Mobile gain control Era will probably be rebranded to T-Mobile Polska in 2007.
T-Mobile entered the Slovak market in May 2005, when it acquired EuroTel Bratislava, and renamed it T-Mobile Slovensko. They have same GSM coverage [2] as Orange Slovensko in Slovakia (third provider Telefónica O2 Slovakia get licence at 10/2006 and launch commercial service in february 2007) [3][4] , and launched the country's first 3G network in January of 2006 (but only in center of capitol city Bratislava). [5].
T-Mobile UK was previously known as One 2 One, and before that as Mercury One 2 One. T-Mobile offers both pay-as-you-go and pay monthly contract phones. The pay monthly contracts are branded as Flext for both 18 month and 12 month contract customers (as of February 2007; T-Mobile's 12 month contracts were previously branded as 'Relax'). The network also offers other contract options for off-peak users and customers who call within network predominantly. T-Mobile launched their 3G UMTS services in the autumn of 2003.
Once the smallest of Britain's four GSM operators, T-Mobile is now the United Kingdom's second largest mobile network, with over 19.2 million subscribers. This has been mainly due to the virtual operators such as Virgin Mobile that use the T-Mobile network infrastructure.
T-Mobile are the official sponsor of West Bromwich Albion, of the Football League Championship and other Scottish Premier League clubs.
T-Mobile USA was previously known as VoiceStream Wireless (formerly a division of Western Wireless until it was spun off as an independent company in 1999 which by the end of that year had acquired regional GSM carriers Aerial Communications in the Midwest and Omnipoint in the Northeast). In May 2001, VoiceStream, along with Southern regional carrier Powertel were acquired by Deutsche Telekom for $24 billion, and changed nationally to the T-Mobile name in September 2002. Headquartered in Factoria, Bellevue, Washington, T-Mobile USA is currently the fourth-largest wireless carrier in the U.S. market with 25 million customers (as of January 2007). As the smallest national carrier, T-Mobile USA tends to compete on price, and advertises heavily to the youth market. [6] They also occasionally decide to compete on features; they were the first U.S carrier to launch a ringback tones service nationally ("CallerTunes"), video messaging and "HiFi Ringers" (ringtones which are clips of an actual song). T-Mobile USA's corporate slogan is "Stick Together", recently changed from "Get More" on October 1, 2006.
Although T-Mobile USA has the smallest native network out of all the national U.S. carriers, it has roaming arrangements with major competitor Cingular as well as with a number of regional carriers such as Centennial Wireless, Dobson, Unicel and SunCom; however, at present T-Mobile To Go prepaid customers have roaming on only a few networks, one being Cingular for nationwide roaming coverage.[7] Customers of T-Mobile To-Go are also banned from using or subscribing T-Mobile's mobile Internet browsing services for anything outside of the "T-Zones" webportal. The overall T-Mobile network exclusively uses the GSM 1900 MHz frequency to build out its native network. [8] Most roaming coverage, however, is provided by affiliate carriers using GSM 850 MHz band (although some is provided using the GSM 1900 MHz band). [9] T-Mobile also launched an EDGE (Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution) network in 75% of its GSM footprint in September 2005. [10] In 2006, T-Mobile plans to spend more time improving coverage and filling gaps in suburban areas, as their network is already well built out in urban areas. In September, 2006, T-Mobile won a bid for large portions of the 3G Spectrum. The 3G network will be based on the UMTS/HSDPA 1700 MHz and 2100 MHz bands (which unfortunately is incompatible with European 3G frequency bands). T-Mobile grabbed up 120 bids covering 474 million people, which means they have multiple spectra covering the super-urban areas and should be launched sometime in 2007.
In contrast with T-Mobile's other international markets, customers do not automatically have access to international roaming. Only contract customers have access to this free feature. The service, called "WorldClass" must be added before traveling overseas, or, if caught overseas by surprise, through a call to T-Mobile from another line (or by using the T-Mobile web site, if the customer has already signed up for web account access). Activation is not instantaneous. Once provisioned, however, there is no monthly fee to maintain international roaming coverage.
T-Mobile's spokesperson through mid-2006 was Academy Award winning actress Catherine Zeta-Jones. (The VoiceStream Wireless spokesperson was Jamie Lee Curtis.) Zeta-Jones was the main figure in T-Mobile's branding strategy; T-Mobile USA also relied on rapper Snoop Dogg as the spokesperson for the company's T-Mobile Sidekick in a series of commercials late in 2004. T-Mobile is also an official sponsor of the National Basketball Association, the NBA Rookie Challenge and the Women's National Basketball Association.
As of September 2006, Catherine Zeta-Jones has officially been dropped as the 'face' of T-Mobile for its US advertising campaigns due to a new corporate rebranding strategy.
At the Consumer Electronics Show 2006, Samsung confirmed that the T709 will be a T-Mobile UMA phone, and it will be released at launch. [11] At the current moment, the service is dubbed T-Mobile HotSpot @Home. The service is an add-on feature for $19.99 per line per month and can be added to rate plans of $39.99 or higher. This fee allows for unlimited nationwide calling on home WiFi terminals, as well as T-Mobile HotSpot locations nationwide. The service is being soft launched in select stores in the Seattle Washington area, with two devices offered with the service: the aforementioned t709 and the Nokia 6136. The service is sold under a 2-year contract only, with the phones costing $50 and the special T-Mobile/D-Link @Home wireless router provided for free. No date for a nationwide rollout has been set.
So far in 2006, T-Mobile USA has captured a total of 11 J.D. Power Awards in the areas of customer care, call quality, and overall customer satisfaction. In particular, it has dominated the wireless industry in the area of customer care, winning all customer care awards for all 6 surveyed regions for four years in a row.
On October 1, 2006, T-Mobile USA launched "myFaves," a new set of consumer rate plans. With "myFaves," subscribers can make unlimited calls to any five numbers on any network, even landlines.
Internet Hotspots (802.11 WiFi)
In addition to mobile phone service, T-Mobile also operates WiFi hotspots in the United States and Europe. In the USA alone it operates over 8,000 (22 December 2006) T-Mobile HotSpot locations for Internet access — including such locations as airports, airline clubs, Starbucks coffeehouses, Kinko's, Borders Books and Music, Hyatt and Red Roof Inn Hotels. The US WiFi infrastructure was completely replaced when T-Mobile bought the Wireless ISP MobileStar.
Nokia, Ericsson T-Mobile Pact
On November 28, 2006 Nokia Corp. of Finland and Telefon AB LM Ericsson of Sweden announced they will provide 3G mobile phone infrastructure to T-Mobile USA. The financial terms of the contract weren't disclosed. In October of 2006 T-Mobile announced it will spend $2.75 billion over the next few years to upgrade to its next generation 3G network.
Statistics of Deutsche Telekom's GSM networks
as of December 2005
- All T-Mobile networks (including affiliates and minority owned) 120 million
T-Mobile branded networks
- Global (under T-Mobile brand) 98 million
- Germany 32 million
- United States 25 million [12]
- United Kingdom 19.23 million
- Poland 12.5 million
- Czech Republic 4.6 million
- Hungary 4.2 million
- The Netherlands 2.3 million
- Austria 2.1 million
- Croatia 2.1 million
- Slovakia 2.0 million
- Republic of Macedonia 0.8 million
- Montenegro 0.2 million
Mobile operators in which T-Mobile has a substantial stake
See also
External links
- T-Mobile International (in English)
- T-Mobile International (in German)
- T-Mobile HotSpots
- Deutsche Telekom (DT) - T-Mobile's parent company