Eight years after launch, MVNE telSpace ready to talk

The mobile virtual network operator space isn’t cooling down, according to the head of mobile virtual network enabler telSpace. However, instead of following the models of Amp’d Mobile Inc. or Helio L.L.C., the newcomers to the space are incumbent local carriers seeking to stem their customer losses, and cable companies looking to expand their offerings.
“It’s a very growing industry, and it hasn’t even begun to peak,” said Paris Holt, founder and chief executive officer of telSpace.
Seattle-based telSpace has an eight-year history as a MNVE-not just enabling the MVNOs, but also enabling other MVNEs to take on clients of their own. Holt, founder and chief executive officer of the company, has worked in various aspects of the industry that used to be known simply as reselling. The company has about 40 MVNO clients, and makes its bread-and-butter with a system of MVNO enablement, largely automated, that Holt says can get an MVNO to launch within about 30 days and at a cost of a few hundred thousand dollars.
If that sounds too good to be true, Holt says he often hears that from prospective clients as well, who want to know what the catch is.
Michael Weston, president of TTI Mobile L.L.C., said that was his reaction as a prospective client. TTI Mobile, which provides private white-label prepaid products for retail outlets and other clients, has used telSpace for the past couple of years, Weston said.
He credited the company with excellent response times and flexibility, compared to other MVNEs that his company had worked with.
“When you call telSpace and you want something done, they’re right on top of it. It’s a lightning-speed effect,” Weston said.
In one recent instance, he recalled, a prospective large retail outlet client of TTI Mobile wanted to make sure certain requirements from its I.T. department were met on back-end integration before they would agree to go through the company. The requirements weren’t part of telSpace’s typically included in its package. So the three companies met, and with help from programmers and a business developer at telSpace, had a specification sheet in two days. telSpace had the integration programming done within a week.
Weston praised the company’s out-of-the-box solution, but added that the company’s ability to tailor specifications and its flexibility are its key advantages-along with a lower price tag, of course.
“They’ve got a top-notch team. You get the feeling these guys really know their stuff, and their platform seems to be the most flexible of all the platforms that we’ve engaged with,” Weston said.
TelSpace regularly snags employees from fellow Seattle company Microsoft Corp., Holt said. The company works with Sprint Nextel Corp. and Verizon Wireless to get network access for its clients, and as of today has added Cingular Wireless L.L.C. to its carrier lineup. He said that from his perspective, Sprint Nextel has become less friendly to MVNOs recently, while “Verizon and Cingular have changed their tune in the last six to eight months” and are now “very pro-resale” and have been asking telSpace clients what the carriers can do to help the MVNOs grow their businesses.
Other companies telSpace is working with include an MVNO that wants to help diabetics track their health, and transmit information to doctors, wirelessly; another will track golf scores. Data access will be increasingly important to MVNOs, Holt said, even though there is usually a lag in resellers gaining access to new networks
The company has been quiet in the MVNO space, Holt said, because it ran into early trouble with clients becoming competitors. Now that telSpace has some patents in place to protect itself, he said, the company is taking a more public stance.