Alex Kinch

Zer01, the curious ‘MVNO-but-not-an-MVNO’ mobile VOIP operator, officially launched it’s services at CTIA this week. Whilst we still don’t know a huge amount of info about the company and it’s promised services, CNET reporter Kent German managed to glean a bit more from CEO Benjamin Piilani.

For those of you curious about the technical aspects of the service and the business model, the following snippets from the interview might be helpful.

First on my list was to ask how the carrier isn’t a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO), even though it depends on major wireless carriers to operate its services. As Piilani explained it, while MVNOs buy capacity from a carrier and resell it later, Zer01 has its own IP backbone and only uses carrier networks to interconnect or roam. I buy that, but Zer01 is more interesting for what it promises.

All Zer01 services operate as data, which means that you won’t be interacting with a standard cellular network. Also, each Zer01 device gets a fixed IP address and it opens a separate VPN session to the company’s servers when placing calls or using data.

Partner carriers will get a share of Zer01’s revenues, though Piilani declined to give details on the carriers and the revenue split. Zer01’s services will work across the entire GSM spectrum including GPRS, EDGE, UMTS and HSDPA.

via Revisiting Zer01 | CTIA show – CNET Reviews.

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