telna Mobile [split thread]

[telnamobile]

Originally Posted by hkr

Yes, SIP would be very useful. It would make it possible to bypass a chain of providers - thus provide better quality at lower costs. It would also make it possible to use your SIM as an extension of IP-enabled PBXes.

It's now on the road map.

Originally Posted by hkr

It would be also useful to have a DID from my own country. That number should also sent as CID when calling out.

Since the calls are going through our network, we already allow you to display whatever caller ID you like when making calls from your telna Mobile SIM card. We thought it could be useful for people who forward their American cellular phone when travelling and don't want to advertise a new additional number to their friends/family/partners.

Originally Posted by hkr

As for me, I do not really need SMS, but a nice feature would be to be able to send SMS as if they would come from my main home number. Receiving SMS is free in most countries I visit, so I would be able to send SMS from one card, and receive SMS on another.

This feature will be supported when we launch the SMS service.

[inquisitor]

Originally Posted by telnamobile

We could imagine this SIP option indeed where you would send the calls to yourtelnamobilenumber@sometelnaserver . Would you need a proxy to register into, and/or are you sending from a fixed IP address?

As VladS said, we would just need a SIP-URI, to which we could forward, however in my case my IP-address would change every 24 hours, as most providers interrupt ADSL-connection once a day here in Germany and I would forward calls from my Fritz!Box Fon (a superb VoIP-ATA/PBX/DSL-router).

We don't pretend to have better rates than everyone else for all countries and we know that roaming to Canada or Mexico for example is a weak point for our service at this time.

Against EU-regulated roaming rates your rates are also kind of weak. But of course since you assign landline numbers you don't have any termination income, which could subsidize inbound rates. On the one hand that makes incoming calls more expensive for your users, on the other hand that saves costs for callers and again for your users, if they forward calls (especially if we could forward calls for free via SIP).

What about data service? Will you offer such?

[telnamobile]

Originally Posted by inquisitor

As VladS said, we would just need a SIP-URI, to which we could forward, however in my case my IP-address would change every 24 hours, as most providers interrupt ADSL-connection once a day here in Germany and I would forward calls from my Fritz!Box Fon (a superb VoIP-ATA/PBX/DSL-router).

We'll do it without registration or anything. It's now on the roadmap.

Originally Posted by inquisitor

Against EU-regulated roaming rates your rates are also kind of weak. But of course since you assign landline numbers you don't have any termination income, which could subsidize inbound rates. On the one hand that makes incoming calls more expensive for your users, on the other hand that saves costs for callers and again for your users, if they forward calls (especially if we could forward calls for free via SIP).

Since our first market is the US, we didn't think it would make sense to offer number on the Isle of Man or Liechtenstein or Iceland where the outrageous rates for incoming calls sponsor the calls. That prevent us from offering free incoming calls like some other services, but at least it's easy for anyone to reach our numbers and we are building a long term business model that ensures the users know the real costs.

Originally Posted by inquisitor

What about data service? Will you offer such?

We'll add the data service shortly. We're working on making sure regular customers don't leave their data on at night downloading useless stuff and ending up with a few thousand dollars of data. From our experience that's the most common trouble.

[inquisitor]

Originally Posted by hkr

As for me, I do not really need SMS, but a nice feature would be to be able to send SMS as if they would come from my main home number. Receiving SMS is free in most countries I visit, so I would be able to send SMS from one card, and receive SMS on another.

What I would appreciate is SMS delivery by eMail or web and SMS forwarding. As I discussed recently with a GSM specialist, it should be possible to modify the HLR, so all SMS (including those from third-party networks) would be first delivered to some SMS-proxy. Depending on user preferences that SMS-proxy would then

1. deliver messages to the phone and/or
2. forward messages to another number (subject to charge) and/or
3. forward message to an eMail address and
4. show all sent and incoming messages on the web.

That would be a very innovative and convinient service, that would open a lot of new possibilites.

Another innovative service would be call delivery including parallel call by SIP, as Austria's A1 (A1 over IP) and Germany's solomo offer. So users could also receive calls for free if received by VoIP (VoIP and GSM would ring simultaneously). That of course will decrease your revenue at first sight, but users would of course use that VoIP-account also for their outgoing calls, which would bypass Israel and so a higher margin could be left for you.

[inquisitor]

Originally Posted by telnamobile

Since our first market is the US, we didn't think it would make sense to offer number on the Isle of Man or Liechtenstein or Iceland where the outrageous rates for incoming calls sponsor the calls. That prevent us from offering free incoming calls like some other services, but at least it's easy for anyone to reach our numbers and we are building a long term business model that ensures the users know the real costs.

I completely understand that. Anyway I wonder why there's no roaming discounter based on a MNO from the European Union, who would benefit from EU-regulated data wholesale tariffs.

We'll add the data service shortly. We're working on making sure regular customers don't leave their data on at night downloading useless stuff and ending up with a few thousand dollars of data. From our experience that's the most common trouble.

That sounds well. Since your service is postpaid, I would appreciate if there was a configurable cap for daily data costs.

[telnamobile]

Originally Posted by inquisitor

What I would appreciate is SMS delivery by eMail or web and SMS forwarding. As I discussed recently with a GSM specialist, it should be possible to modify the HLR, so all SMS (including those from third-party networks) would be first delivered to some SMS-proxy. Depending on user preferences that SMS-proxy would then

1. deliver messages to the phone and/or
2. forward messages to another number (subject to charge) and/or
3. forward message to an eMail address and
4. show all sent and incoming messages on the web.

That would be a very innovative and convinient service, that would open a lot of new possibilites.

Those are actually features we intend to provide once we have the SMS feature with our service. We were going to store all incoming text messages in a mailbox on our website and then you would have the choice to let them go to your telna Mobile phone or forwarded via email or both. We could also store outgoing messages.

Originally Posted by inquisitor

Another innovative service would be call delivery including parallel call by SIP, as Austria's A1 (A1 over IP) and Germany's solomo offer. So users could also receive calls for free if received by VoIP (VoIP and GSM would ring simultaneously). That of course will decrease your revenue at first sight, but users would of course use that VoIP-account also for their outgoing calls, which would bypass Israel and so a higher margin could be left for you.

This makes sense, but that requires we develop a whole new product. It will be a little bit later as we have to do things in order.

[telnamobile]

Good news. The VOIP interface for inbound calls has been added.

Since this is kind of an advanced-feature, we put it in our "developers" box where we will add all the special features that don't really make sense for "basic" customers, but make a lot of sense for the tech specialists.

telna Mobile - Low cost cellular service for international travelers(reduced roaming for inbound and outbound calls while abroad)

[DRNewcomb]

Originally Posted by inquisitor

Another innovative service would be call delivery including parallel call by SIP, ... So users could also receive calls for free if received by VoIP (VoIP and GSM would ring simultaneously). That of course will decrease your revenue at first sight, but users would of course use that VoIP-account also for their outgoing calls, which would bypass Israel and so a higher margin could be left for you.

What it looks like we are building here is a combination of features from Google Voice, Truphone, Gizmo and an international SIM. Google Voice has a virtual SMS number which forwards SMS to a US cell phone. It also has online voicemail. Truphone forwards calls to VOIP or mobile based on if the VOIP is connected or not. Gizmo provides VOIP connections to all sorts of places. I've often wished I could get them to work with each other better.

[VladS]

TelnaMobile looks like a pretty promissing service, but I for one will pass as for all international customers they ask for a copy of the national ID.

Just like I wouldn't give service providers my SSN (or canadian SIN), I don't distribute copies of my ID(s).

[inquisitor]

Originally Posted by telnamobile

Good news. The VOIP interface for inbound calls has been added.

I'm impressed!