Fone Forum

Middle Eastern company Viacloud has partnered with T-Mobile in a bid to be an ‘alternative operator’ in the UK, and to create a Mobile Virtual Network Aggregator (MVNA).

The deal will allow Viacloud to launch MVNOs on T-Mobile’s network.

MVNAs, which allow smaller companies to launch a mobile business without a cost to the operator, are becoming an increasingly popular model, with 3 launching the first partnership last year, with 'aggregator' X-Mobility.

The model allows operators to add MVNOs to their remits while saving on marketing costs, which are absorbed by the MVNA.

Viacloud CEO Mutaz Otaibi said: ‘We are delighted to partner with an industry-leading organisation such as T-Mobile, and are looking forward to offering a unique and reliable range of mobile services to customers in the UK.

T-Mobile UK chief marketing officer Srini Gopalan said: ‘T-Mobile UK is delighted to be supporting Viacloud’s ambitious expansion plans for the UK market.  This deal signals our intent to become a major player in the ethnic MVNO arena.

‘With international calling card minutes rapidly migrating to mobile, this is an excellent time to be forging new partnerships in this segment.  Viacloud builds on our existing MVNO partnerships and underlines our ambitions to target new growth areas in the wholesale market.’

Viacloud was established in Bahrain in 2004 and since then has grown through acquisitions in the Middle East.

See:-   here (http://www.mobiletoday.co.uk/Mobile_Exec/Viacloud_signs_mobile_deal_with_T-Mobile_UK.aspx?fragment=&SearchType=&terms=).

so what are the differences between MVNA and MVNO in simple words? perhaps a silly question but it seems to be a bit confusing for me :]

Completely different! An MVNA does not actually operate a virtual network under its own name, but is a company that faciliates the easy setup of various MVNO's. In short an MVNA's customers are MVNO's. Basically, the MVNA sets up all the complex bandwidth and billing agreements with the host network, which enables various small MVNO's to setup their brand quickly and easily.

If you or I as some random small player wants to set up "ABC Mobile", then you can pretty much forget dealing with the big network operators. However, an MVNA will likely listen to you as all they really want to see is the cash!

Therefore expect to see many more MVNO's hitting the market in the next year! More supermarkets (even smaller ones), chain retail stores, airlines, Newspapers, TV Channels etc. Pretty much anybody with a large customer base that they can somehow cling onto customer loyalty with! (e.g. I am guessing randoms like Boots Mobile, Aldi Mobile, Lidl Mobile,...)

As far as I understand it, if a MVNO wants to start up ( for example when Virgin started with T-Mobile ) it has to set up a partnership deal with the network, in which every detail has to be negotiated, and placed in a contract.  This may be quite a lengthy process.

Where a Mobile Virtual Network Aggregator (MVNA) gets involved, any new MVNOs don't have to do any of the negotiating / contracting work themselves, as there is an existing deal established between the network and the MVNA.  This means that new MVNOs have a very easy ride as they just accept the existing deal, and don't have to enter into lengthy negotiations themselves.

The MVNA will obviously make something out of the arrangement; the network benefits from more business; but potential new MVNOs have a quick and easy start up route with minimal delays.

If anyone would like to correct any of this, or add to it, please feel free to post a reply.

( Apologies to petkow as we were both replying at the same time. )

No need at all to apologise. Cross posting! In fact I was also editing my post after!

So have you thought about setting up "foneforum mobile"?   ;D (I think it's only a very small 6 figure sum needed to set one up! Still better than 7 or 8 figures I suppose)

That's not in my league   :'(   ....... but who know what Mikael is dreaming about !       ;D

MVNE also seems to be in use - I think the last word is supposed to be enabler, probably means the same as the A

There are rumoured or conjectured numbers about the minimum size needed to make an mvno viable, so maybe these aggregators can help to shrink the number. In theory there may be some private mvno brands that aren't actually retailed.

I'm a bit sceptical as to what might appear though. And some disappear again. There was a group of several German ones all launched on the same platform a couple of years ago or so, but most of them closed and got re-absorbed into one brand

And other products call themselves an mvno, or offer their resellers the opportunity to become one, when they are actually more or less just resellers themselves. SIM cards can be supplied in plain white, just the serial number and perhaps PIN and PUK, and they print it themselves

One interesting mvno brand in this country has roaming on 3 different networks. How many of us know who it is?

All right, I'll bite.  Were you referring to Jersey Telecom andy ?        :-\

( It's the only possibility of which I could think. )

No, UK based

I think Andy is talking about: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abica

However, I think there are also some more with agreements on more than one UK network. In other countries it is also quite common to have MVNO's and some of the smaller Network operators that have agreements with multiple players.