Global Roaming – An opportunity for business?
While travelling abroad and utilising various transportation methods I often wonder why mobile hotspots are not more common on the longer journeys. For instance travelling from parts of France to parts of Germany can be an all day ordeal via train (even at 300 km/h). You would think that with the prevalence of the internet there would be Wifi available on the trains. Technology has advanced to a point to allow aircraft to offer Wifi services, so surely it wouldn’t be too difficult to provide this service on a train.
Or are we being shafted already?
Or maybe its a case of the telecommunications companies wanting to continue to shaft us with exorbitant pricing for their existing global roaming solutions. Technology is no longer a barrier for providing these services, the infrastructure is already present in many places. I wonder how long it will be until global roaming prices fall to a point where we no longer have to think about turning the option off on our phones when travelling abroad.
Its possible that other countries have cellular providers that offer better plans/alternatives, but to give you an idea of the differences in pricing schemes from NZ, while travelling in Europe I will pay $2.50 NZ per mb (with Telecom NZ), where as my wife’s cell provider (2 Degrees) charges $10 NZ per mb. Who is pulling who’s leg here, I thought the $2.50 per mb was bad enough, but $10? Take that pricing into account, then consider Telecom’s roaming prices of $6 and $10 per day for Australia and the UK respectively.
These pricing structures almost suggest that the telecommunications companies are having just as much of a laugh as the oil companies are when it comes to price fixing setting.
Journey from Code to Sales 