Germany Mobile Market - Discounters

[snaimon]

Originally Posted by Effendi

In the last days, at the Prepaid Mobile conference in Prague, it was very interesting to listen to a director of Yesss MVNO in Austria. He said that in Germany the MVNOs like Simyo have not a great success due to the internet-based selling and that is their big limit, and good advantage for Aldi and Tchibo which have of course tons of selling points throughout Germany. He said also that in his opinion Aldi has the cheapest rates and no one will go even lower with new offers, so it confirms what Teltarif says, i.e. that in Germany we have reached (almost) the bottom for low-cost tariffs, at least for now and with the actual termination costs.

I think your observations are absolutely correct.

Aldi has the lowest prepaid rates (15 cents all outbound, 5 cents internal) AND the distribution chain. Of course, E+ coverage is not as good as the D-networks, so there is some disadvantage. BUT (big but, of course) if Aldi can take customers and calls from the biggies, rates there might come down. SIMYO etc run a close second, but as you noted, distribution is the problem.

My problem, and probably not unlike many others, is that I have invested in 2 D1 SIMs and have refills in reserve. The numbers don't mean anything to me, but I would imagine others who have had their #s for some time, would NOT like to switch numbers. Of course, they could always put a greeting on their voicemail box informing callers of the new #.

I don't think there is much hope for rates LOWER than Aldi, but we can hope that the D-network providers will lower some rates -- either network internal where on D-1 they are 39 cents per minute (main time) and 19 cents (off peak). Likewise, rates to landlines and other mobiles could be lowered from 39 cents. At least that is my hope. My XtraOne rates to other mobiles and landlines is 79 cents weekdays. Simply absurd, I would say.

I am debating whether of not to buy some Aldi cards when we go there in summer.

Thanks for all,

Stan