EcoCarrier, based in Markham, Ontario, Canada, may not be a household name in the United States, but at ITEXPO (News - Alert) West in Austin, TX, it has caught the attention of a lot of attendees. It also caught the attention of our judging panel winning a Best Consumer Offering award. The provider of a variety of managed services was the sole winner in the category not just for one but for two interesting new services that have been added to its portfolio of cost –saving yet quality offerings. These are:

• TopUP360: a prepaid PIN-based or PIN-lessairtime credit transfer program
• Mobile Broadband on Demand Service (MBBoD): an inexpensive mobile roaming data and SMS service on a 3G SIM that works on 182 mobile networks in 103 countries.

At a show where the most cutting-edge technology is on display, and where the value proposition is top of mind with the focus on what’s next, it was refreshing to see how value can be achieved through ingenious marketing approaches that leverage existing technology in unique ways to the benefit of under-served and/or under-appreciated markets.  

TopUP360, the gift you can keep on giving

We are all familiar with the success Western Union (News - Alert) achieved with wired money transfers. They enabled generations of people to send funds around the world to friends and family. In a mobile world where communications is a valuable commodity, enabling loved ones or friends to be able to communicate inexpensively is almost literally worth its weight in gold. It is the driving force behind the growing business of called Airtime Credit Transfer Service.

What TopUP360 does is allow migrant and expatriate communities in industrialized countries to send a small gift to a loved one back home in the form of an “Airtime Credit Amount” to the recipient’s mobile number account, literally topping it up. The recipient is notified of the credit amount by the mobile service operator the instant it arrives. S/he can then use it to call the sender or anyone else.

The capability is being marketed under the brand name Gift-to-Call Card™. It is available in $5, $10 and $15 versions. It enables you to top up someone’s mobile number account in some 72 countries.

How does it work? A simple text message in a certain pre-defined format that includes the PIN (obtained from the card) is sent to credit the amount you want to gift to the operator that services the recipient’s mobile number. And purchases to registered users can be done online.

In an exclusive interview with TMCnet.com, Carl K.S. Teo, President of EcoCarrier, stated that the beauty of TopUP360 is “not only its ease of use in transferring something of extraordinary value, but that it leverages the fact that a call from many parts of the world to industrial countries like the U.S. is a lot cheaper than a reverse call.” For example, Teo says the TopUp360 Gift-to-Call ™ Service for a call from Haiti to USA or Canada costs less than 50 percent of what it costs to call from USA/Canada to Haiti. The same is true with Guatemala and Jamaica and many other countries. A visit to the company’s web site provides lots of information about comparable savings around the world.

Inexpensive data while roaming

A somewhat different set of customers are the target of Mobile Broadband on Demand Service (MBBoD) which operates under the brand MData Service.

The service enables users with 3G mobile devices to email, browse the Web and interact with various mobile apps while roaming at extremely low cost. Per MegaByte data transfer prices range from US$0.54 to US$1.99, and currently can be used in some 39 countries. If you are a global road warrior and have looked at your bill, you know that this can translate into savings of as much as 90 percent over charges from the large mobile carriers.

 MData service can be used with the MData SIM as a standalone SIM, as a Dongle pre-installed with it or as a clear device named MiWiFiLAN pre-installed. An attractive feature of MiWiFiLAN (and hence the name) is the ability to use the 3G phone embedded WiFi-LAN capability — allowing the user to create their own WiFi LAN through a 3G network without replacing the SIM card in them.

Ecocarrier (News - Alert) also has mobile dialer applications that encrypt IP telephony using less than 100 Kbytes of data transfer per minute of a SIP call of excellent service voice quality.  Again, the proof is in the savings. Teo says the total cost of a one minute call (taking into account the cost of Internet access through MData SIM service and the cost of call termination through a premium service carrier) from any EU country to US would cost less than US$0.08 per minute. He points out, “That is the cost of a one minute call made when one is mobile roaming in EU countries!”  

And, if that were not enough, Ecocarrier is not resting on its laurels. It will soon be introducing a One-Account-for-ALL WiFi (News - Alert) Hotspot Service that works in more than 250,000 Hotspots in some 130 countries with high level of security embedded in the service operation.

About the company(s)

As stated at the top, EcoCarrier and its affiliated corporate entities, QiiQ Communications Inc. and VIVE, are not household names. However, consider the following:

• Supported by partners who are leading technology providers, service providers, carriers, and network operators they are currently carrying monthly 10 billion minutes of call traffic over their packet-switched network.
• Their portfolio of capabilities includes a variety of managed services, with products such as VoIP gateway, prepaid calling card, PINless calling card, roaming SIM card, mobile broadband on demand, callback services, PC-to-phone, and more. These services are available in 80 countries including 40 in Africa.

Serving unfulfilled needs such as inexpensive minutes of use for voice and data for under-served individuals and geographies, along with catering to the needs of those of us just looking for a good deal, can be just as innovative as producing a new technology. EcoCarrier, by understanding that putting a consumer product in the market that can facilitate inexpensive yet quality communications in an increasingly connected world deserves recognition for its ingenuity. And, not incidentally, in the case of TopUP360 think of the joy it can bring to people’s lives who otherwise might not be able to interact with their loved ones.

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO West 2011, taking place NOW, in Austin, Texas. ITEXPO offers an educational program to help corporate decision makers select the right IP-based voice, video, fax and unified communications solutions to improve their operations. It's also where service providers learn how to profitably roll out the services their subscribers are clamoring for – and where resellers can learn about new growth opportunities. To register, click here.

Peter Bernstein is a technology industry veteran, having worked in multiple capacities with several of the industry's biggest brands, including Avaya, Alcatel-Lucent, Telcordia, HP, Siemens (News - Alert), Nortel, France Telecom, and others, and having served on the Advisory Boards of 15 technology startups. To read more of Peter's work, please visit his columnist page.