New cellphone carriers cutting into big three’s turf; expect bloodshed, more annoying ads

It’s a classic tale of David vs. Goliath—that is, if Goliath, instead of getting his head chopped off, just adjusted his business plan slightly. Canada’s three new wireless providers—Wind Mobile, Public Mobile, Mobilicity—are doing better than expected against Canada’s once-powerful cellphone trifecta, according to the Financial Post. And they aren’t just picking up new teenagers with their cheap plans; they’re poaching long-standing clients.

“About three-quarters of all subscribers with Wind Mobile, Mobilicity and Public Mobile have been cherry-picked from the three major incumbents, a report from Scotia Capital says. It is a higher percentage than some thought would prevail…”

The good news is that to protect their market share (which is still a whopping 96 per cent) Rogers, Telus and Bell will likely voluntarily hit at their own bottom lines, which means cheaper service (we hope). The Post reports that Rogers is even going to unveil a new discount provider in response to its prepaid competition. Rumour has it that the provider will be called Chat.r. Although Rogers wouldn’t confirm, the name seems to have that grammatically misguided “born in a focus group/aimed at teens” vibe about it.

While we welcome more competition in the cellphone racket, we aren’t looking forward to the inevitable increase in annoying marketing. We don’t know how much more of that annoying Koodo luchador we can take, and Virgin’s fun-loving hipsters aren’t much better.

• Wireless upstarts stealing Big 3’s customers [Financial Post]