Xfera
Encyclopedia
Yoigo is the fourth mobile phone operator with a network of its own in Spain
. They operate a UMTS/3G and 1800 band network, which at their launch in December 2006 had very limited UMTS (3G) coverage even in some of the largest cities. In places where there is no UMTS coverage, Yoigo users switch to national roaming
using movistar
's both GSM and 3G networks.
, the Spanish building company Grupo ACS
and Scandinavian cell phone carrier Sonera (now TeliaSonera
).
Yet after several technology and market problems in 2001, in line with the general launch delay suffered by UMTS technology all throughout Europe, the company was at a standstill for several years. Its only operations during that time were creating their brand image, trying to achieve an agreement with an existing network operator to act as a backup for their fresh born 3G network and setting up some base stations so as to not lose their UMTS license, which required them to have some active service prior to a given date.
As of June 2003 most of its owners were complaining about the huge amount of money they had lost in the yet-to-be-launched project, and finally in summer 2003 Vivendi --which faced problems of its own at that time-- left the company by selling its shares to the rest of owners at the symbolic price of €1.
In December 2003, with the backing of the remaining shareholders, the Board of Directors decided to make an additional investment of €135 million, and opened negotiations with Amena (now Orange España) and Vodafone
Spain, in the hope of using someone else's network as a backup coverage while Xfera's own network was built. Further increasing operating costs, for legal reasons the company was obliged to keep some base stations operating from 2003 on, despite the fact that the company had no actual users. This was due to the terms in the license Xfera had been awarded, and failure to comply with such terms would have put Xfera in a poor position to rebuild a network, or even to keep the license.
The remaining shareholders as of May 2005 were some Spanish companies without any previous experience in Telecoms (ACS at 34.8% of shares, Corporación Financiera Alba at 11.7%, Abertis at 8.4%, FCC at 7.5% and Abengoa at 5.4%) with technical support from Sonera (now TeliaSonera, a Scandinavian cell phone carrier) who owned a non-controlling stake of 32.2%.
Nevertheless, after years of ignoring Spanish Government's threats to have their license removed, actual operations started in June 2006, when TeliaSonera, a minority holder until then, acquired up to 76.56% of Xfera's shares and stated that they would restart building its UMTS network and start offering mobile services later in the year.
In October 2006, Xfera announced that it would launch the commercial service in December under its new brand Yoigo. The new name was chosen to reflect the simplicity in rates and ease of use of their services.
The logo also bears some resemblance to the style of 3's and Vivo
's, which also have no single color set, and change colors between uses.
Yoigo's operations were hastily brought to market by TeliaSonera under pressure from the Spanish government, who had seen a six-year delay in the actual use of a much-valued UMTS license. Ironically, Yoigo's president claimed they held a European record in bringing a cell company to market, since from the time when TeliaSonera had gained control to the actual date of launch only 150 days had passed.
As a result of the haste, Yoigo was basically a shell company that operated in cooperation with several subcontracted firms: Dextra Móviles for handset purchase and logistics, Seur for delivering and other companies for customer service. There was some trouble initially, especially shipping handsets and SIM cards because of discoordination between companies.
Also, Yoigo was born with largely sparse coverage of its own, relying heavily on a national roaming agreement with Vodafone's GSM network. Thus, services such as fast 3G internet access were restricted to those on Yoigo's own coverage footprint, limited to the largest cities, and others like video calling were not present at all (and continue to be unavailable as of March 2011). The coverage agreement with Vodafone was later replaced by another one with movistar
.
As for the sales network, Yoigo signed an exclusive 3-month agreement with The Phone House (Spanish branch of The Carphone Warehouse
) for distribution of their products in physical shops, while making most of their sales at their online shop. In April 2007 talks were started with other distributors like Carrefour
and El Corte Inglés
, as Yoigo is not expected to create any sales network of its own. It does have only-brand stores under the form of franchise
s owned by The Carphone Warehouse and other smaller groups.
However, the simple and cheap tariffs Yoigo offered (12 euro cents per minute plus 12 cents for setup fee at every call, at any time or number within Spain) plus the inexpensive data plans (0.12 cent/KiB up to a maximum of 1.20 € a day) have made it quite a success. The company itself announced having tripled their expectations during the first months from launch and credited this unexpected success for the delays experimented in shipping of orders.
In January 2009 Yoigo reached their first million customers.
Yoigo's competitors range from the three big mobile phone network owners in Spain, Movistar
(from Telefónica
), Vodafone
Spain and Orange España, to the new MVNOs
like Simyo
, Carrefour
Móvil, Euskaltel
Móvil, Happy Móvil (from The Carphone Warehouse) and Lebara.
If a new customer wants to migrate from another company and keep his number, he must provide the same ID number. Otherwise this number portability process ("portabilidad" in Spanish) will fail and must be repeated. When the customer simultaneously buys a new mobile phone, as is often a feature of many Yoigo offers, the customer will be obliged to pay twice for the mobile phone and must request to be reimbursed. In many cases, customers have been waiting up to 1 year for reimbursement.
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
. They operate a UMTS/3G and 1800 band network, which at their launch in December 2006 had very limited UMTS (3G) coverage even in some of the largest cities. In places where there is no UMTS coverage, Yoigo users switch to national roaming
Roaming
In wireless telecommunications, roaming is a general term referring to the extension of connectivity service in a location that is different from the home location where the service was registered. Roaming ensures that the wireless device is kept connected to the network, without losing the...
using movistar
Movistar
Movistar is a major Spanish mobile phone operator owned by Telefónica Móviles. It operates in Spain and in many Latin American countries. It is the largest carrier in Spain with 22 million customers and 41.58% of market share. Its principal competitor in Latin America is America Movil...
's both GSM and 3G networks.
History
Originally the carrier was to be called Xfera, a name reflected in its nowadays registered name of Xfera Móviles, SA. It was formed in 2000 as a consortium to compete for a new UMTS license in Spain, which finally won out. At the time, its main shareholders were French company VivendiVivendi
Vivendi SA is a French international media conglomerate with activities in music, television and film, publishing, telecommunications, the Internet, and video games. It is headquartered in Paris.- History :...
, the Spanish building company Grupo ACS
Grupo ACS
Actividades de Construcción y Servicios, S.A. is a Spanish company dedicated to civil and engineering construction, all types services and telecommunications. It is one of the leading construction companies in the world, with projects in many countries around the world...
and Scandinavian cell phone carrier Sonera (now TeliaSonera
TeliaSonera
TeliaSonera AB is the dominant telephone company and mobile network operator in Sweden and Finland. The company has operations in other countries in Northern, Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Spain, with a total of 150 million mobile customers...
).
Yet after several technology and market problems in 2001, in line with the general launch delay suffered by UMTS technology all throughout Europe, the company was at a standstill for several years. Its only operations during that time were creating their brand image, trying to achieve an agreement with an existing network operator to act as a backup for their fresh born 3G network and setting up some base stations so as to not lose their UMTS license, which required them to have some active service prior to a given date.
As of June 2003 most of its owners were complaining about the huge amount of money they had lost in the yet-to-be-launched project, and finally in summer 2003 Vivendi --which faced problems of its own at that time-- left the company by selling its shares to the rest of owners at the symbolic price of €1.
In December 2003, with the backing of the remaining shareholders, the Board of Directors decided to make an additional investment of €135 million, and opened negotiations with Amena (now Orange España) and Vodafone
Vodafone
Vodafone Group Plc is a global telecommunications company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the world's largest mobile telecommunications company measured by revenues and the world's second-largest measured by subscribers , with around 341 million proportionate subscribers as of...
Spain, in the hope of using someone else's network as a backup coverage while Xfera's own network was built. Further increasing operating costs, for legal reasons the company was obliged to keep some base stations operating from 2003 on, despite the fact that the company had no actual users. This was due to the terms in the license Xfera had been awarded, and failure to comply with such terms would have put Xfera in a poor position to rebuild a network, or even to keep the license.
The remaining shareholders as of May 2005 were some Spanish companies without any previous experience in Telecoms (ACS at 34.8% of shares, Corporación Financiera Alba at 11.7%, Abertis at 8.4%, FCC at 7.5% and Abengoa at 5.4%) with technical support from Sonera (now TeliaSonera, a Scandinavian cell phone carrier) who owned a non-controlling stake of 32.2%.
Nevertheless, after years of ignoring Spanish Government's threats to have their license removed, actual operations started in June 2006, when TeliaSonera, a minority holder until then, acquired up to 76.56% of Xfera's shares and stated that they would restart building its UMTS network and start offering mobile services later in the year.
In October 2006, Xfera announced that it would launch the commercial service in December under its new brand Yoigo. The new name was chosen to reflect the simplicity in rates and ease of use of their services.
The logo also bears some resemblance to the style of 3's and Vivo
Vivo (mobile phone network)
Vivo is the largest mobile phone service provider in Brazil and in South America with over 60 million users. It originated from the merger of several Brazilian mobile phone operations under a joint-venture owned equally by Portugal Telecom and Spain's Telefónica; however, Telefónica is now its...
's, which also have no single color set, and change colors between uses.
Yoigo on the market
As a result of the haste, Yoigo was basically a shell company that operated in cooperation with several subcontracted firms: Dextra Móviles for handset purchase and logistics, Seur for delivering and other companies for customer service. There was some trouble initially, especially shipping handsets and SIM cards because of discoordination between companies.
Also, Yoigo was born with largely sparse coverage of its own, relying heavily on a national roaming agreement with Vodafone's GSM network. Thus, services such as fast 3G internet access were restricted to those on Yoigo's own coverage footprint, limited to the largest cities, and others like video calling were not present at all (and continue to be unavailable as of March 2011). The coverage agreement with Vodafone was later replaced by another one with movistar
Movistar
Movistar is a major Spanish mobile phone operator owned by Telefónica Móviles. It operates in Spain and in many Latin American countries. It is the largest carrier in Spain with 22 million customers and 41.58% of market share. Its principal competitor in Latin America is America Movil...
.
As for the sales network, Yoigo signed an exclusive 3-month agreement with The Phone House (Spanish branch of The Carphone Warehouse
The Carphone Warehouse
Carphone Warehouse Group PLC , known as The Carphone Warehouse, is Europe's largest independent mobile phone retailer, with over 1,700 stores across Europe. It is based in the United Kingdom and is a 50% subsidiary of Best Buy...
) for distribution of their products in physical shops, while making most of their sales at their online shop. In April 2007 talks were started with other distributors like Carrefour
Carrefour
Carrefour S.A. is an international hypermarket chain headquartered in Levallois-Perret, France. It is one of the largest hypermarket chains in the world...
and El Corte Inglés
El Corte Inglés
El Corte Inglés S.A. , headquartered in Madrid, is the biggest department store group in Europe and ranks fourth worldwide...
, as Yoigo is not expected to create any sales network of its own. It does have only-brand stores under the form of franchise
Franchising
Franchising is the practice of using another firm's successful business model. The word 'franchise' is of anglo-French derivation - from franc- meaning free, and is used both as a noun and as a verb....
s owned by The Carphone Warehouse and other smaller groups.
However, the simple and cheap tariffs Yoigo offered (12 euro cents per minute plus 12 cents for setup fee at every call, at any time or number within Spain) plus the inexpensive data plans (0.12 cent/KiB up to a maximum of 1.20 € a day) have made it quite a success. The company itself announced having tripled their expectations during the first months from launch and credited this unexpected success for the delays experimented in shipping of orders.
In January 2009 Yoigo reached their first million customers.
Yoigo's competitors range from the three big mobile phone network owners in Spain, Movistar
Movistar
Movistar is a major Spanish mobile phone operator owned by Telefónica Móviles. It operates in Spain and in many Latin American countries. It is the largest carrier in Spain with 22 million customers and 41.58% of market share. Its principal competitor in Latin America is America Movil...
(from Telefónica
Telefónica
Telefónica, S.A. is a Spanish broadband and telecommunications provider in Europe and Latin America. Operating globally, it is the third largest provider in the world...
), Vodafone
Vodafone
Vodafone Group Plc is a global telecommunications company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the world's largest mobile telecommunications company measured by revenues and the world's second-largest measured by subscribers , with around 341 million proportionate subscribers as of...
Spain and Orange España, to the new MVNOs
Mobile virtual network operator
A mobile virtual network operator is a company that provides mobile phone services but does not have its own licensed frequency allocation of radio spectrum, nor does it necessarily have all of the infrastructure required to provide mobile telephone service...
like Simyo
Simyo
simyo is a no frills brand of a mobile virtual network operator operated by KPN in Belgium, Germany, France, the Netherlands and Spain.The company was founded in May 2005. Its headquarters are in Düsseldorf from a four-member team led by Rolf Hansen, the current CEO. Participation was initially...
, Carrefour
Carrefour
Carrefour S.A. is an international hypermarket chain headquartered in Levallois-Perret, France. It is one of the largest hypermarket chains in the world...
Móvil, Euskaltel
Euskaltel
Euskaltel, S.A. is a telecommunications company based in the Spanish autonomous community Basque Country, with its headquarters in Derio . Its name literally translates into English as "Basque-Tel"...
Móvil, Happy Móvil (from The Carphone Warehouse) and Lebara.
Billing issues
According to various reports, Yoigo has been experiencing teething problems with its billing department. Any normal process is carried out rapidly and efficiently, however, if intervention by their billing department is necessary, responses become slow, labourous and even defensive.If a new customer wants to migrate from another company and keep his number, he must provide the same ID number. Otherwise this number portability process ("portabilidad" in Spanish) will fail and must be repeated. When the customer simultaneously buys a new mobile phone, as is often a feature of many Yoigo offers, the customer will be obliged to pay twice for the mobile phone and must request to be reimbursed. In many cases, customers have been waiting up to 1 year for reimbursement.