Filed under: Cellphones

Back in the early days of Engadget, everyone — including us — thought mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) were totally poised to be the next big thing. And why not? You get to be a wireless carrier without having to operate your own infrastructure (which is by far the most expensive, difficult part). Just what the doctor ordered for the big, stodgy wireless carriers, each struggling to balance differentiating themselves while trapping their customers in their walled content and services gardens.

What we got instead was failed business model after spectacular failed business model, leading to a domino effect of collapses that left just a precious few companies standing. Let’s take a look at the carnage over on Engadget Mobile, shall we?

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Filed under: Cellphones

Alright, we’ll definitely cop to having broken off a relationship or two via text message, but we don’t think we’ve ever heard of a high-ranking executive discovering he’d been fired when his phone stopped working — which is exactly what happened to Roy Kosuge, COO of Voce, that “luxury” MVNO. We’d heard rumors of Voce’s demise, but it looks like ol’ Roy wasn’t so plugged in, only finding out that his company was dead when his phone stopped making calls. Of course, when a company’s chief operating officer doesn’t know that you’re about to kill the lights, it’s a safe bet that things are pretty screwed up, so if you were among the few who signed up for Voce’s premium services, we’d recommend calling your credit card company immed — oh, right. Sorry about that.

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Filed under: Cellphones

We don’t know for sure what’s up yet, but we’re hearing that customers of Voce, the luxury MVNO based on AT&T’s network, woke up on February 1st to zero service, dead customer service lines, and even some crazier claims like being double-billed for the final month of service. We gave their sales lines — usually the very last thing to go down — a ring, and got no reply. It’s possible this could be some kind of huge misunderstanding and outage on Voce’s part, which we do hope it is, because if they did shut down they certainly did so in about the most abrupt, impudent way imaginable. Either way, looks like guys are going to be out for the count — we wouldn’t exactly expect a mobile phone provider to go completely dark, ignore its customers for days, and expect to retain any business.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

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