BT is in discussions to buy EE

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Absolutely, school aged children definitely shouldnt have mobile phones.

Lol.

[jim]

If O2 & EE are up forsale, maybe they are not doing too well financially!
Too many cheap phone deals!

I was chatting with someone from EE recently who said that the proliferation of SIM only contracts and cheap mobiles was making their business really difficult.

In the old days you could sell a £30 pm contract with a bundled phone and no-one was quite sure what was phone and what was calls.

Now with all of the cheap mobiles, like the Nexus and the One Plus One, coming to the forefront, and people buying iPhones directly from Apple, it's more obvious - and the SIM-only market is so competitive that there's hardly any money in it.

From his point of view, they're in a very precarious position right now - and EE has the boon of being the 4G market leader to fall back on. Not so good for the others.

The current theory is that the only way to survive is to go QuadPlay - i.e. to offer broadband, TV, phone and mobile all in the same package. Virgin already do it, and EE are attempting to. If one of these go ahead, then so will BT - you'd expect Sky to be next in line. It does make sense.

[pp05]

Once 5g comes will we need landline?

4g gives me better uploads than my landline. EE missed a trick.

[crossy]

Absolutely, school aged children definitely shouldnt have mobile phones.

Secondary ("High" in Scotland) school kids pretty much need them to function (so it seems). And I must admit to being happy to let them have them, given it's handy for arranging lifts etc from after school classes etc. Before that though, is a no-no in my book.

Severe moment though - my wife was telling me that one of the folks at the kids ballet class was saying that she's bought an iPad for her youngest this year, and will getting them an iPhone in two years. Problem I have though is that said sprog is only three! Hope the little brat bankrupts them with IAPs!

[crossy]

I was chatting with someone from EE recently who said that the proliferation of SIM only contracts and cheap mobiles was making their business really difficult. In the old days you could sell a £30 pm contract with a bundled phone and no-one was quite sure what was phone and what was calls. Now with all of the cheap mobiles, like the Nexus and the One Plus One, coming to the forefront, and people buying iPhones directly from Apple, it's more obvious - and the SIM-only market is so competitive that there's hardly any money in it.

Good point - probably goes someway to explaining why the Three guy I bought my SIM from recently seemed pretty happy to sell me a SIM+LG G3 bundle, and a lot less happy when I explained that I'd already got the phone.

The current theory is that the only way to survive is to go QuadPlay - i.e. to offer broadband, TV, phone and mobile all in the same package. Virgin already do it, and EE are attempting to. If one of these go ahead, then so will BT - you'd expect Sky to be next in line. It does make sense.

Maybe there's a possibility - BT goes "large" and gets EE, leaving the smaller (and cheaper) O2 for Sky to get - picking up BT's crumbs. Quad play definitely is a good idea for the companies offering it, but it only really makes sense to the consumer if there's some financial advantages. For example, Virgin Mobile offer free calls to Virgin landlines and mobile plan discounts if you have the other products.