New firm tapping into prepay phone niche

An Auckland start-up hopes to carve a niche in the $2.3 billion mobile phone market by wholesaling Vodafone's network to customers who want savings over prepay call charges but don't want to sign up to two-year phone contracts.

Black+White, founded by former Telecom executive Johnathan Eele, will seek to win over prepay phone users by offering calling plans that customers can cancel with 30 days' notice.

Mr Eele says the high take-up of prepay phones is an unusual feature of the mobile market in New Zealand.

"About 70 per cent of mobile users use prepay. Internationally, that figure is more like 40 per cent. We are making things simple and saving people significant amounts of money without asking them to sign their lives away."

Black+White's cheapest plan costs $30 a month plus 60 cents a minute for calls, with 600 texts included. Higher monthly fees buy free calling minutes and progressively cheaper calling charges, culminating in a $220-a-month plan that includes 600 "free" minutes and 49 cents a minute for extra calls.

Posts on online message board Geekzone welcomed the simplicity of the plans, but some queried the scale of the savings over prepay call charges.

Black+White will use the 028 prefix, though customers of other telcos can switch and keep their phone numbers.

The company is wholesaling Vodafone's network through Australian-listed telco M2, which plans to resell Vodafone connections to small businesses. TelstraClear has a similar arrangement to resell Telecom's mobile network, and more telcos are expected to market offers through Vodafone.

A more significant development in the mobile market is expected next year, when NZ Communications hopes to join Vodafone and Telecom as a third mobile network operator.

- © Fairfax NZ News