Last year GigSky announced that it would offer iPad cellular data plans in around 90 countries by leveraging Apple’s new carrier-agnostic Apple SIM now included in the device. Today the company is expanding availability of those plans to 140+ countries, giving more iPad users the ability to purchase data plans through GigSky without going through a local carrier.
Since first launching its new Apple Music subscription streaming service for users last June, and bringing it to China in September, Apple has been slowly bringing it to more countries behind the scenes. Today, Turkey is the latest to get access as the service quietly launches for users in the country.
Verizon will launch brand new, simpler data plans and kill subsidies as expected from August 13. Today, the company introduced a set of plans which will require customers to pay for their smartphones in monthly installments, or buy them outright, instead of having the cost subsidized.
Apple today has informed employees of significant changes to how iPhones are sold via AT&T and Verizon Wireless, according to sources. As we reported last month, Apple has indicated that iPhones sold via AT&T at both physical Apple Retail Stores and on the Apple Online Store will move exclusively to Next financing plans this month, in June. This means that a customer who wants to buy a new iPhone on AT&T will no longer be able to do so on a subsidy…
Update: American Airlines has confirmed that the problem was with a bad update to the Jepson app that added Ronald Reagan Airport map. The app provides maps of runways and more information to pilots. Until the app can be fixed, the airline has informed pilots of a workaround to prevent future delays.
Two years ago, American Airlines replaced the paper versions of its cockpit documents with iPad flight bags on all planes. At the time, the airline touted that the switch would both save money for the company and make the lives of pilots easier. This evening, however, more than several dozen American Airlines flights have been affected by an outage related to the app used by American Airlines pilots. Many flights have been delayed and passengers forced to exit the planes.
T-Mobile continues to shake up the wireless industry by introducing a number of affordable plans and options as part of its ongoing Un-carrier initiative. Today, the carrier announced that it is expanding choices for prepaid customers with new Simply Prepaid plans for as little as $40 per month. The new plans will be available for new and existing customers on January 25th.
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Right as news is breaking that the Apple and Beats deal is finally official for $3B, the Beats iOS app has just been updated with new pricing and an extended free trial for all users.
Up from the previous free 7-day trial offered by the service, Beats Music now offers a “no strings attached trial” for 14 days to all users. Most notable in the update, however, is the fact that the service is slashing pricing from $119.88 a year to $99.99/year:
We’ve dropped price of our yearly subscription to $99.99, down from $119.88.
The service will continue to charge $9.99/month for users not purchasing a yearly subscription. The Beats Music website FAQ has been updated to reflect the new pricing and also continues to list $15/month family plans and extended free trials offered to AT&T customers.
Apple also confirmed today that it will continue to operate Beats Music as a separate service including Android and Windows phone apps.
Version 2.1.0 also includes “tons of bug fixes so the whole experience runs smooth as silk.”
● We’re stoked to announce that our no strings attached trial has been extended to 14 days to ensure everyone gets ample time to explore the full Beats Music experience.
● We’ve dropped price of our yearly subscription to $99.99, down from $119.88.
● To top it off, we pushed tons of bug fixes so the whole experience runs smooth as silk.
Though T-Mobile probably has more name recognition than no-contract carrier Cricket, the latter carrier is speaking up about its competitive iPhone plans.
Cricket is making its iPhone plans more affordable starting today, lowing its unlimited calling, messaging, and 1 GB data plan to $50, which has been standard for other devices. Customers can opt for 2.5 GB or 5 GB of data at $60 and $70, respectively.
Customers with two smartphones on a family plan can save $10 for each line at $40 per line for the standard plan.
It appears that Cricket isn’t going to sit back and watch T-Mobile and Virgin run away with pre-paid iPhone sales.
We were on hand in New York City today to watch the unveiling of the iPhone on T-Mobile and its new LTE/plans that purport to save T-Mobile customers a lot of money over its U.S. competitors.
T-Mobile tipped us to its grand plan to become the ‘Uncarrier’ at CES in January 2013. The idea is to radically simplify the phone plan purchasing experience by cutting away most complexities of the carrier agreements. The effort was very forward thinking and Apple-like in that sense, and the results are certainly a big change for the industry.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Zv5wdX1zp0
You basically start with a $50 a month unlimited data plan and go from there. T-Mobile will throttle you after 500MB, unless you give them $10 or $20 more a month, which gives you 2GB or unlimited before un-throttling. Family plans are $30 for the first extra device and $10 for each one thereafter. I imagine most normals will pay $50 a month. That’s a lot less than the typical iPhone user pays.
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But, let’s not kid ourselves on what’s motivating T-Mobile here. It has been losing customers like crazy and that’s largely due to its failure to carry the iPhone. The iPhone represents well over half of all smartphones on every other big U.S. carrier, and it will likely dominate T-Mobile over the next few years. T-Mobile said that even though it won’t officially support the iPhone until April 12, it currently has over 2.1 million iPhones on the network. That’s about to skyrocket…
CEO John Legere comes from over a decade at Global Crossing, an IP Data backbone firm, so cutting through all the B.S. and delivering fat delicious packets of data is his specialty.
