Cell C's move to offer BlackBerry phones and solutions is a precursor to aggressively entering the high-end data communications arena ahead of its new fourth-generation (4G) network rollout, says Karin Fourie, Cell C's head of corporate communications.
Tomorrow, Cell C will hold a press conference during which it will detail other offerings it plans to release once its R5 billion 4G network is operational - at a date still to be determined.
Cell C, the smallest of the mobile network operators, has traditionally been aimed at the lower end of the market, while its joint venture, Virgin Mobile, has targeted the more affluent part.
However, Virgin Mobile will not offer a BlackBerry solution for the time being.
Jonathan Newman, head of marketing and strategy at Virgin Mobile, says should his firm decide to offer BlackBerry, it would strike a separate deal with manufacturer Research In Motion (RIM).
“We cannot piggyback on the Cell C deal, as RIM does not operate that way,” he says.
Vodacom and MTN have offered the BlackBerry for several years.
Fourie says the company announced in December 2009 that it would expand its network coverage and roll out a high-speed broadband offering, using HSPA+ technologies with download speeds of up to 21Mbps.
“Cell C is in the process of rolling out its 4G network, a network that will offer consistently higher speeds and wider and deeper coverage, particularly for data. Cell C's position is unique in that it is the first operator to roll out UMTS using the 900MHz frequency band,” she says.
At launch, Cell C will offer its customers the BlackBerry Curve 8520, Curve 8900 and Bold 9700 smartphones, as well as BlackBerry Enterprise Server for corporate customers and BlackBerry Internet Service for smaller businesses and consumers.
BlackBerry Enterprise Server is for organisations that manage their own e-mail servers. The software integrates with IBM's Lotus Domino, Microsoft Exchange and Novell GroupWise. It provides security and IT policy controls to enable secure, push-based wireless access to e-mail and other corporate data.
BlackBerry Internet Service bundles provide a range of services for smaller businesses and consumers. This includes the ability to access up to 10 supported corporate and personal e-mail accounts (including most popular ISP e-mail accounts such as MWeb, Yahoo Mail and Google Mail) from a BlackBerry smartphone.
The BlackBerry Curve 8520, Curve 8900 and Bold 9700 smartphones are all available on current Cell C postpaid packages, including the newBlackBerry All Week 100 for R199, which gives customers 100 anytime minutes across all networks. BlackBerry Internet Service is included with this package.
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