The service has been available from Orange SA for a year in France, where it leverages parent France Telecom SA’s own network of hotspots for WiFi connectivity, and was also rolled out in Poland. In its current stage of development, it offers corporates access over GPRS and 3G, as well as 12,000 hotspots operated by Orange France, BT OpenZone, and Swiss aggregator WeRoam.
A spokesperson for Orange said a corporate customer can buy bundles which correspond to an amount of megabytes of data, which can then be shared by its itinerant employees. We find companies prefer to buy access as a cash bundle rather than a volume of megabytes, and we advise them on the size of the bundle that will suit their requirements, he said.
The corporate traveler then calls up a software client on his or her laptop, which announces what forms of connectivity are available in a given location. Connection can then be made, with the usage being deducted from the organization’s credit. On the WiFi side, this obviates the need for any settlement in local currency with a hotspot operator.
On the cellular side, access is available wherever Orange has a roaming partner. In the US, this will mean using a triband data card with the US frequency for GSM (1900MHz) and, in the future, one with 2.02GHz for US 3G, where European 3G operates in 2.1GHz. Orange has roaming agreements with both the leading US GSM operators Cingular and T-Mobile.
