Commentary

Marin Perez
 

Helio Kicking The Bucket?

Don't call it a phone company. In fact, don't bother calling it at all, because various reports are saying that Helio will follow in the footsteps of Disney Mobile, ESPN Mobile, and various other defunct mobile virtual network operators.

Don't call it a phone company. In fact, don't bother calling it at all, because various reports are saying that Helio will follow in the footsteps of Disney Mobile, ESPN Mobile, and various other defunct mobile virtual network operators.


More Mobility Insights

White Papers

More >>

Reports

More >>

Webcasts

More >>

Multiple sources are saying that merger talks between Virgin Mobile and Helio are going nowhere, and the Helio stores and kiosks will be shutting down soon. Current Helio users -- which include me and ... well, I'm sure someone else -- may or may not continue to have service under another provider.

This isn't a shock, by any means, as most who've been following the industry knew Helio was circling the drain. The real issue is that Helio had no clear demographic. The stylish and hip ads can appeal to the youngsters, but they can't realistically afford a $70-plus-a-month subscription.

For all its faults, Helio was very good about emphasizing 3G data speed. But the people who have those data needs were given no compelling reason to bypass the major carriers for the not-a-phone company.

I'm not trying to sound too harsh, as I think the Helio Ocean is an unrecognized gem. Its GPS, Web browsing experience, dual-sliding form factor, and Google Map integration were wonderfully done.

Even if this report isn't true, it will only be a matter of time before Helio shuts its doors, and the wireless space will lose another competitor.


Related Reading




Currently we allow the following HTML tags in comments:

Single tags

These tags can be used alone and don't need an ending tag.

<br> Defines a single line break

<hr> Defines a horizontal line

Matching tags

These require an ending tag - e.g. <i>italic text</i>

<a> Defines an anchor

<b> Defines bold text

<big> Defines big text

<blockquote> Defines a long quotation

<caption> Defines a table caption

<cite> Defines a citation

<code> Defines computer code text

<em> Defines emphasized text

<fieldset> Defines a border around elements in a form

<h1> This is heading 1

<h2> This is heading 2

<h3> This is heading 3

<h4> This is heading 4

<h5> This is heading 5

<h6> This is heading 6

<i> Defines italic text

<p> Defines a paragraph

<pre> Defines preformatted text

<q> Defines a short quotation

<samp> Defines sample computer code text

<small> Defines small text

<span> Defines a section in a document

<s> Defines strikethrough text

<strike> Defines strikethrough text

<strong> Defines strong text

<sub> Defines subscripted text

<sup> Defines superscripted text

<u> Defines underlined text

InformationWeek encourages readers to engage in spirited, healthy debate, including taking us to task. However, InformationWeek moderates all comments posted to our site, and reserves the right to modify or remove any content that it determines to be derogatory, offensive, inflammatory, vulgar, irrelevant/off-topic, racist or obvious marketing/SPAM. InformationWeek further reserves the right to disable the profile of any commenter participating in said activities.

Disqus Tips To upload an avatar photo, first complete your Disqus profile. | View the list of supported HTML tags you can use to style comments. | Please read our commenting policy.
T-Shirt Giveaway T-Shirt Giveaway: Each week we're selecting one great comment from our readers. The author of the comment will receive an InformaitonWeek Community t-shirt. So get posting!
Subscribe to RSS

Resource Links