Belgian MVNO Mobile Vikings has launched a data-only plan consisting of 8 GB for €15.00 (US $16.75) per month. The offer targets customers who no longer use the mobile network for calls and instead rely on IP messaging apps for calls and texts.
Subscribers of the data-only plan are still able to receive calls and texts, but there are no minutes or SMS included. Vikings said that especially young people are relying on Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp to make calls. According to the operator, users under 18 call less than 20 minutes per month on average.
For prepaid users, Mobile Vikings increased the data on its top plan, which costs €25.00 (US $27.92) per month. It now comes with either 8 GB or 4 GB, depending on whether customers choose the data focus or the calls focus. In addition, the company introduced a new option at €20.00 (US $22.33), for 6 GB or 3 GB of data. With 6 GB, customers pay 30 cents a minute for calls, whereas with 3 GB, calls are 15 cents a minute. Both plans include unlimited SMS and unlimited on-net calls.
One of the chief virtues of any mobile plan is relevance to the needs of the marketplace, and in their quest for subscribers, operators are slicing the market thinner and thinner. In particular, MVNOs are pursuing highly targeted approaches to various demographics, and in-depth knowledge of a given population’s usage habits is the key to success in this regard. In this case, Mobile Vikings, as a budget MVNO aimed at the youth market, has taken note of the fact that traditional telephony and SMS texting are very much on the decline among young users.
It is well known to observers of youth culture that members of that demographic are remarkably averse to speaking on the phone, for personal or even work reasons, vastly preferring to text, email, or message each other within social media apps. The latter two are accomplished via mobile data, and even when it comes to texting, youth are favoring OTT text-message services such as WhatsApp over operators’ native SMS or MMS functionalities. Furthermore, on those occasions when they do wish to use voice, young users have IP-based voice services available to them, such as WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. While this is most true of those under 18, it is also a characteristic of the under-30 cohort.
Furthermore, young users tend to be very large consumers of mobile data, mainly to access streaming entertainment content and for online gaming. In light of these facts, a data-only plan—and a generous one at that—appears to be a very good idea as part of an operator’s portfolio. While that is especially true for a budget MVNO, we think that major operators may also want to include data-only options in their plan lineups.
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