Virgin Mobile launches prepaid broadband

We knew about Virgin’s broadband offering back in May, but today they finally announced it. The Virgin Mobile broadband plan is just about ready. It will be offered along with the Novatel Wireless MC760 modem at Best Buy later this month. The modem will cost $149.99, and there are a few pricing plans for the service, all of which are pay-as-you-go. After the jump we’ll take a look at what Virgin has in store.

Here is a list of Virgin’s plans:

It does look a bit expensive, but that’s what you’re going to get when there’s no contract involved. The $60 plan looks particularly rough, because contract carriers offer five times more data for the same price. Again, without that contract companies are just going to charge more.

In fine print at the bottom of that image, Virgin lays out the typical usage level for Web browsing (20 MB/hour), streaming video (4 MB/minute), and email (1 MB/100 emails). Of course, individual usage will vary.

The worst part of this deal is the 30-day expiration. I can see the 600 MB plan making sense for an occasional email-checker, but not if the card expires in 30 days.

While it’s nice to see a prepaid service roll out a mobile broadband plan, it seems a bit expensive for serious users. We’ll see how it works out for Virgin. They seem to know their customer base well, but they’ve also been forced to lower prices because of competition — see their unlimited plan, which is down to $50 from $80. There’s no competition yet, though, so they could be good for a while.

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2 Responses

1. Arthur K Says
   

   I think it is expensive when you compare what they offer in Australia. We can get 1GB for on average $25 – 30 days expiry. I am sure as more competition joins, prices will fall.

   
   Posted on August 31st, 2009 at 3:31 pm
2. Starr Handley Says
   

   A mobile broadband will give you the opportunity to know what is happening over the world even if you are in solitary confinement. You access to the internet and get information from all corners of the world, including the latest happenings.

   
   Posted on March 30th, 2010 at 7:06 pm

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