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O2 are currently advertising a SIM-only deal (which they call “simplicity”) on their website, which is £20/month, and includes 600 mins/unlimited texts. If that wasn’t enough, there isn’t a contract tie-in either. Obviously the deal isn’t unique as other Operators have this offering, but in a more general sense, I’d like to “open a question to the floor” if I may, with the IntoMobile readers….

Do you prefer a higher price, locked-in, contract period WITH a Mobile Device of your choosing, or, do you prefer the pretty much contract-less approach with the SIM-only deals being offered?

If you have a strong opinion on this (and I am sure our readers will!), then let us know by dropping a comment! If enough people respond, we’ll revisit the issue and see whether the lure of a new handset is enough to get you to tie-in to a (typically) 18 month contract at a higher monthly rate…..

…so says Nokia.

The statement is based on the results of a trial run between a number of parties, including the aforementioned Finnish vendor, O2, London Underground, and Barclays. In the “O2 wallet” trial, users carried an NFC-equipped Nokia 6131 mobile, which was able to make payments much as an Oyster card (season pass for London Underground)  would do. It was also able to make retail payments using “Barclaycard Visa payWave” in certain stores - and all via the magic of contactless (NFC) technology.

NFC relies on inductance to create a current that is then passed through a chip in (typically) a plastic card, but in this case, a mobile device. The technology has long been around in Japan with Sonys Felica system, however, this trial of 500 people reasonably proves the demand over here.

• 78% said they would be interested in using contactless services if available. Convenience, ease-of-use and the status of having such an innovative device were seen as the main benefits
• Interest in having Oyster on their mobile phones was particularly strong with 89% of trialists saying they were interested in taking this up
• Over two-thirds of trialists also said that they would be interested in having the Barclaycard Visa payWave feature on their mobile in the future

All sounds good to me - give all the upcoming Nokia devices some form of NFC, and you never know, this idea might just develop the critical mass it needs to go mainstream!

You can read the full Nokia PR here.

We knew O2 has wowed to offer the iPhone 3G sans any contracts as a “Pay and Go” device. However, when we covered the story in June, other than this information we hardly knew anything else. Now we have more details to report.

First the pricing - O2 will sell the 8GB and 16GB iPhone 3Gs for 349.99 GBP and 399.99 GBP, respectively. Yes, it’s kinda expensive but the price includes full year of unlimited web browsing and WiFi. Afterwards, to keep the habit going you’ll have to pour out 10 GBP every month.

As for the release date, the Pay and Go iPhone 3G is hitting the UK market on September 16th when interested users will be able to grab the device in O2 stores, The Carphone Warehouse and Apple stores.

On the downside, though, Visual Voicemail isn’t included in the service with “Pay and Go” iPhone 3G, but something’s gotta give, right?

[Via: Engadget Mobile]

I’ve been a fan of O2 for a while in respect of their Marketing efforts, and turning the Millenium Dome in to a desirable venue was no mean feat. Justin Timberlake was awesome on a different level when he played there, and so it’s with great pleasure I can report that Kanye West is coming to the O2 (again) in November.

Kanye’s latest album has been a masterclass in how to lace high-quality lyrics with phat sampled beats, and his live show is variously reported as being stunning. So get your interweb-clicking fingers on the mouse button and check out here for pre-order of tickets. Nice!

O2 has announced that it is continuing it’s sponsorship of the England Ruby team for another four years - this will mean it will run beyond the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand. The deal is worth about £4 million per season, and run to 31st August 2012.

O2 is promising it’s customers more player access, and more unique mobile content also - as an O2 customer myself, I can’t wait! Come on England!!

[Via: Mobile Choice UK]

O2UK has issued a new set of criteria for channels partners, regarding the upgrade of customers. Dealers must now check details against a database of O2 subs, to verify the “ownership” of the customers, and also to gain approval. The point of the checks are to see how the customer was acquired before they can be resigned to a contract - they should be resigned via the existing channels, and be subjected to a ton of calls from other sources.

However, some sources claim customer “ownership” is unclear, particularly if customers have signed/re-signed with different O2 channels over the years, or added additional services via different parties. They are also concerned that this could be a move that allows poaching from O2’s direct team.

Adding process for the sake of it is never a good thing, but my take on this is that it’s a good move by O2 to bring some consistency to how customers are handled during upgrade - and that IS a good thing.

[Via: mobilenewscwp.co.uk]

Polaroid has partnered with O2UK, to sell it’s PoGo Instant Mobile Printer . This accessory will now be sold in all 480 of O2’s retail stores. The PoGo weighs in a 8 ounces, and uses Bluetooth to transfer images for printing.

The PoGo launched in July this year, and has already been available in the Curry’s chain of shops (including PC World), plus at John Lewis. Online, you can find it at Play.com and Amazon. Cost (RRP) is apparently around £99.99.

Does anyone have one of these? Thoughts and comments if you do please!

[Via: cellular-news.com]

O2UK and Sony BMG have launched a new music store which apparently is the first to be supported by both a label and an operator (I am not sure if this makes it better or not, but it’s a different twist on the music play…). The service will be known as “MyPlay”, and can only be accessed through the O2 Active portal.

Content products will include videos, full track audio and realtones via artist microsites. Videos are priced at £1.50, realtones at £3.50 and music tracks at £0.99. Whilst the service should utilise Sony’s extensive catalogue, the launch will see a subset of artists available at launch - the idea being to offer in-depth content, rather than a huge variety.

O2UK already has an existing music download store which is powered by Napster - and that apparently includes 5 million songs - so the above strategy provides an interesting way to address the same market in a different way.

[Via: GSMworld.com]

O2UK recently posted financials showing that it has added 275K customers in the last quarter of this year, bringing it’s subscriber base to an impressive 18.7mn - however Telefonica (the owner of the group) has at the same time shown a 48% decrease in revenues….

The addition of 138K contract customers has been largely attributed to the iPhone, giving a result that contract subs are now 38% of the total base. Interestingly, O2 also cites that Prepay subs have also gone contract since the launch of it’s “simplicity” tariff, which has no device, but is a lot cheaper per month.

I would imagine that on the face of things, O2 have got to be happy with these, stats, especially combined with the low churn rates that they have - however, as a component of Telefonica, that’s not the whole picture - Telefonica reported a 48% drop in year on year operating income.

So it’s a mixed bit of news - some good, some bad. But you can but all of the OpCo groups in Telefonica will be especially focussing on maintaining and boosting ARPU, whilst giving special attention to customer retention. That could spell good news for those whose contracts are ending soon - don’t forget to bargain!

[Via: Mobile News International]

O2 has begun offering a joint mobile and fixed broadband deal for customers. Those that sign up to get O2 Mobile Broadband for £20/month (which includes 3GB of data and unlimited WiFi) will get the standard home broadband package free for a year.

This a clever move by O2, as it adds real value for the customer, but also allows O2 to really “own” the customer - with some good analytical software, they should be able to find out A LOT about the internet usage of their customers - meaning even better and more tailored deals.

The joint offer is available for customers signing up to O2 Mobile Broadband between 1 August and 31 October 2008 who live within the O2 Home Broadband network – approximately 60 per cent of the UK population. The deal is also available to existing O2 Mobile and Home Broadband customers. Customers wanting to upgrade to a higher speed package or not covered by O2’s broadband network will receive a £7.50 per month discount on their chosen plan for 12 months.

[Via: Macworld]