Tech
Dave Wireless Up Next
Dave Wireless is gearing up for a launch next year, joining WIND Mobile as the latest new entrant in what was previously a very limited landscape for mobile voice and data in Toronto. When it will launch is still a closely guarded secret. While billboards and transit ads were recently erected in Toronto and Ottawa, company spokesperson Sheryl Steinberg would only tell me that they plan to launch in "the first quarter of 2010". President Dave Dobbin was even less specific, stating "early 2010" (but not confirming whether this meant the first quarter) citing intense industry competition as reason why most details about the company remain under wraps.
I spoke with Dobbin via phone on Friday to try to find out how, if at all, Dave Wireless will be different from the just launched WIND. He wouldn't offer any specifics, instead resorting to marketing speak that the company will "bring simplicity and flexibility to the wireless world". He did mention, however, that his company will be focused on fewer markets than WIND (they are attempting to be a national player), resorting to roaming agreements with Rogers to get service outside of metropolitan target markets like Toronto, Ottawa, Calgary, Vancouver and Victoria.
Dave Wireless is also only focused on the consumer market (WIND targets the business crowd in addition to consumers) and Dobbin joked they "won't be building a bronze statue", a reference to the statue WIND unveiled outside of the Queen's Quay terminal earlier this week.
But beyond that it's anyone's guess whether Dave will actually present consumers with a more attractive option. Dobbin wouldn't confirm that they'll be offering "no contracts" (even though their initial ad campaign hints to that effect), but did say their aim is NOT to be the low cost provider. He said they intend to offer more simple pricing than WIND and more value. He also promised they'll have a wider range of name brand handsets to choose from, although he declined to identify what any of them will be.
Dobbin told me the company's head offices are in Vaughan where they currently employ about 100 people. The plan is to ramp up to 350 by launch. Given the massive growth and the fact they just signed their AOR (advertising agency of record) I'm guessing they won't be launching until after the snow starts to thaw in March.
And when they do, don't expect to see any ads screaming Dave Wireless. That's just the name of the company and not the brand name (still unannounced) they'll be going to market with.
Discussion
18 Comments
Sort By Oldest First / Newest First
Subscribe
Sorry to start the comments off with a Grammar Police remark, but it should be "fewer markets", not "less markets".
I am loathe to defend the likes of Ma Bell or Rogers (I've lost count of the number of times I've sparred with Bell), but in the quest for 'choice' and free markets, we sometimes lose sight of the fact that Canada is the 2nd largest country in the world and has one of the lowest population densities. Is it fair that upstarts like Dave and WIND will pick off the biggest, most dense markets, then leave the rest of Canada to twist in the wind?
We sometimes forget that the reason for the CRTC's existence is that cost of providing services ACROSS Canada aren't cheap, and either the government has to pick up the tab (thus raising our taxes) of infrastructural costs, or the major players are 'forced' to provide national service.
Either way, we pay. Armchair critics that love to hate big companies sometimes lose sight of these facts: it costs a lot of money to do business in a country this large and we either have to force big companies to, or encourage them to.
Just saying, is all...
This is going to be exciting. These guys know what's up.
If Bell, Rogers and Telus didn't rake in record profits. If they didn't have the highest profit margins in the entire world, I would agree with you. http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2008/09/04/tech-profit.html So either you are very uninformed, or you're a shill for one of the big three.
That is the biggest load of shit I've heard.
Yes, gadfly, it is fair.
Bell or Rogers are not required -- by the CRTC, or by anyone else -- to provide wireless service anywhere they don't want to. If they'd like to stop then, by all means, let them go ahead.
In the event that the end-result is no service for rural areas, then it will fall to the CRTC to do something about it. But thus far, that has not been required.
Isn't it interesting that more and more the internet is catering to the lowest common denominator? Turdsnot (must have blown a blood vessel coming up with that name), your MENSA application is in the mail. Thanks for contributing to the conversation....
As for the rest of the remarks, well, with business acumen like that, no wonder this country is hurtling toward 3rd world status...
...Really?
I missed the part where you show their points are invalid.
gadfly - give me a break. Do you know anything about cellular operators in the 1st biggest country in the world, in Russia? Do you know HOW COMPETETIVE their GSM market is? Do you know HOW CHEAP their voice AND data plans. So give me a break, please. Russia has 4 nationwide GSM operators with TONS of various plans to choose from, FREE (government-ruled) incoming calls and tons of VAS. Canada NEEDS competition, and if DAVE & WIND are going to bring it here - two thumbs up for both of them.
Most of European providers have free incoming calls as only "clever" Canadians would get suckered in and accept something as ludicrous as having two people pay for the same phone call (the caller and receiver). The rest of the world is apparently really dumb and actually charges only the person making the phone call for it...
Then why aren't you living in Russia, if a measure of a country's desirability is based on only the cost of its phone service...? That' hilarioius, thanks for my morning laugh.
Don't forget about Public Mobile! They are no frills 40$ talk and text. I'm hoping DAVE is going to have better phone selection than WIND (even though they are introducing SIM cards this week) There aren't a lot of good phones which are compatible with their frequency...
gadfly, also consider this: about 75% of Canada's population live within 150 kilometres of the United States border. Obviously, there is no connection between ridiculously high cell communication rates and Canada being 2nd largest country in the world. It's a lame excuse. Take a look at Rogers coverage maps - they are clearly not covering even a 1\4 of the country.
gadfly: "providing service to a large geographic area is necessarily very expensive"
melted: "Actually Russia has a larger landmass and has cheaper plans"
gadfly: "Oh then why don't you move there!!!"
this is the rebutting argument from gadfly, who was complaining that OTHERS are bringing down the level of intelligent discourse in this country.
thanks for MY morning laugh, gadfly.
Gadfly, you had a point - the cost of building and maintaining a nation-wide network in a large country with low population density is expensive - but it's only one possible factor in a multi-factor equation.
I don't agree with turds (figurative and literal) who simply dismissed your point with no explanation, but nor do I agree with your subsequent responses.
You ignored Paul's comment on a 2008 Merrill Lynch report which shows that the big three wireless providers in Canada, which together control a whopping 95% of the national wireless market, are *the most profitable* among the 23 developed nations surveyed. You also seem to be unaware of the widely-reported fact that the OECD recently found that Canada had some of the highest wireless rates in the developed world, see http://bit.ly/2DPz8Z. There is an obvious correlation between the latter and the former.
Finally, when Melted pointed out that Russia has cheaper rates than Canada, despite facing comparable geographic size and density issues - a comment which goes directly to your main point - you dismissed him/her with a cheap "then why aren't you living in Russia" retort. So lame.
I think your first point is interesting, but if you want to have an intelligent conversation about this topic, you're going to have to bring more than that to the table.
>gadfly on December 21, 2009 at 8:43 AM , replying to a comment
>from Melted
> Then why aren't you living in Russia, if a measure of a country's > desirability is based on only the cost of its phone service...?
Who said about measuring desirability based on the cost of its phone service? And what is rediculous - the price for the wireless usage cell providers charge. Would you like to argue that the cost of the equipment (which is produced all in one place - China, Taiwan, Malasia) is too much different in Russia/Ukraine and Canada? Of, course, the installation and workforce costs are obviously less in Russia and Ukraine.
But just so you know: the average cost of one minute talk in Ukraine is 2-3 canadian cents per minute. And government regulatory incoming calls are free. And there are plans, when all outgoing calls within provider's network are free. Also, there is no such thing as "roaming within country" in Ukraine. You can use your cell throughout the country and wherever you are, calls would cost you the same. And you don't have to pay extra for the rediculous so called "call display", being an essential part of the cell technology it is a non-detachable feature.
Now this is what I call "competition".
And charging 35c per minute of talk, imposing users to purchase "prepaid" minutes, add-ons, data-plans and whatsoever - is quite opposite. It's called MONOPOLY. And it needs to be dealt with.
I can't wait to dump Telus in April when my 3 year contract is up!!! Enough of the ripoff!