Helio: another MVNO in trouble?
by Chris Ziegler 
posted Jul 6th 2006 at 2:36PM
It looks like Amp'd and ESPN Mobile aren't the only MVNOs discovering that their business models may not be getting them where they want to be. An unconfirmed report out of Telecoms Korea is brewing that Helio -- chic Kickflip and all -- has managed to sign up 100 (yes, that's one hundred) subscribers since launching a couple months back. SK Telecom, which teamed up with Earthlink to form Helio, is denying the reports and insisting the true number is in the thousands, but either way they've fallen well short of projections. It looks like we now have an explanation for Helio's shockingly generous gadget trade-in program. SKT also looks to shore up Helio's lineup with as many as five new models by year end, but we have to wonder -- if 100 subs is an accurate count, is there any hope for a turnaround?UPDATE: We just got an official response from Helio about this: "This morning's report by Telecoms Korea is wholly inaccurate and does not represent Helio's membership figures." They wouldn't tell us any more than that, but they're adamant that the figures reported aren't correct.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jon Gales @ Jul 6th 2006 3:18PM
This story's link is to an article that's behind a paid firewall. Is there another source or can someone that has a subscription quote the story here?
Todd @ Jul 6th 2006 4:08PM
LOL - 100 subscribers total, thats funny. Maybe the people that work at Helio can start forcing their relatives to sign-up.
Once the employees get 100 family members, they can have a press release that says "MARKET MOVER: Helio's subscription base soars over 100%!!!...."
Rom @ Jul 6th 2006 4:32PM
They picked a very niche market... I guess too niche.
Charles @ Jul 6th 2006 4:52PM
You may not want to root against Helio too much (despite the Scientology connection). Helio is targeting the segment we all belong to: people who want the best, most advanced phones available. If it fails, the big 4 can point to it and say "See, the public doesn't want advanced phones. They want cheap-ass free phones. Why should we offer phones and services like those available in Japan?" Hopefully, Helio can push out the really advanced stuff (not the mediocre crap like the Hero and Kickflip) before it's too late. Right now, you can get more advanced phones on Verizon, and that's just sad.
Todd @ Jul 6th 2006 5:03PM
Charles?
Helio phone aren't that great. If they can do what you say and "push out advanced phones"...they need to do it like TODAY, before the end of the business day and have a rep email me with a rebate coupon.
The best phones only come from gray market importers and are heavily seem edited to work on our evil domestic networks. I seriously doubt Helio can come up with Moto's SCPL before bankruptcy court.
Rom @ Jul 6th 2006 5:05PM
@4:
That's what their campaign started out as, but it turned out to be for Myspace fanboys.
HelloMoto21 @ Jul 6th 2006 6:04PM
Whew...thank God they didn't choose me to work for them....then they'd only have 85 subscribers.
Codelicious @ Jul 6th 2006 6:13PM
my god! i had a prototype of their phone Hero. it's bulky and ugly. not chic at all, unless you consider ugliness as chic. the camera, the dual-sterophones, flash, ... just plain ugly and disgusting!!! no one would use that phone.
ryan libson @ Jul 6th 2006 7:00PM
Is it really that far off to think that a company captained by Mr. Boingo himself might throw us a phone that was dual mode- wifi/cellurar...UMTS whatever you want to call it? I too think that this company came out of the gates with a nice concept but poor integration. Someone forgot to tell Skye that the myspace folks "like totally already got the new pink razr!"
Justin @ Jul 6th 2006 8:02PM
As a phone phreak, I'm very happy with my Hero handset. I really don't care so much about provider-provided (hehe) content, what matters to me is being able to play my own music, movies and photos. The Hero is great at this - a QVGA, 1000kbps MPEG-4 encoded video @ 24fps plays flawlessly, in widescreen. Photos look great, music sounds great.
Frankly the two things I wish they'd have added is J2ME support! They're sticking with the SK-standard "Wipi" language or whatever, and a built-in browser that didn't support ONLY WAP. But with new products down the line, hopefully they'll move back towards their original vision of being an MVNO for the truly geeky.
I dig the look of the Hero, in person it's not nearly as big nor ugly as the photos make it look. It's slick, solid, great battery life, reception and sound. But the Kickflip pretty much bites - only thing really good about it is the form factor. The lack of a good graphics coprocessor means your own videos look really lousy at the supported 64kbps bitrate, the photos are stored in this weird proprietary "database" format, and so forth.
-_- @ Jul 6th 2006 9:11PM
meh.
6 is right; this thing is for myspace people (who i am NOT), therefore, the ui will be simple, the features not so expansive, and the design clean. however, there will be myspace support (thx to ev-do and a 2 mp camera) and the ability to "beg" and "borrow" (or whatever) games.
it's a media-but-not-so-much phone.
Paul @ Jul 6th 2006 11:42PM
This report doesn't make any sense. I'm an independent dealer selling Helio. In two months my store sold 120 activations. Am I the only dealer they signed up? =) Helio has thousands of dealers now, and some are doing well and some are not. From my calculations, activations should be in the thousands. Bring out more cool phones, more plans, and continue with good customer service, I think it'll last for a long time.
Dan @ Jul 7th 2006 1:26AM
Well. Too me low figures are obvious. This phone is marketed at myspace users. Yes, there are some 70 mil of them. But most of them, let's say 95% are high schoolers. None of them are economically independant. So only the uber rich ones could possibly aquire this phone. Then there are foreigners on myspace. Let's guess they account for 4%. That leaves 1% of the market able to purchase this phone, and most of them are still bogged down with contracts, or they have the RAZR, which may not be as good of a phone, but is more attractive.
PEZ @ Jul 7th 2006 1:06PM
Considering That koeran company made the phones for them, I would say its pretty true.
Klaus Kohlert @ Jul 7th 2006 1:15PM
There is only one way to successfully operate a MVNO, cheap prices and a lean organization. Helio is the exact opposite and therefore will fail.
Klaus Kohlert @ Jul 7th 2006 1:39PM
BTW: The maker of Helio's Kickflip, VK just went bankrupt today.
uf911 @ Jul 9th 2006 7:36PM
They've got to have more than 100, or even a couple of hundred subscribers. I'm a paying subscriber, though I rarely use the phone - picked it up for competitive analysis.
The first two layers of the UI are pretty interesting, even if there's still room for imporovement, but beyond the first two layers it's all 1999-era mobile application design.
Korean phones may be 'advanced', but I'll still take a Windows Mobile-based HTC device any day of the week.
Ken Adams @ Aug 12th 2006 5:14PM
I just wanted to start selling them in my Sprint/NEXTEL store where I also do computer
repair and PlayStation rentals/repair... etc.
I've owned my Hero since May 2006 and I'm already
filling up my third 1GB Flash-memory card for my
personalized music collections mixed in with some
AWESOME NEW WIDESCREEN VIDEOS like Snoop's NEW
Your so Beautiful with Raffell...
Helio is having growing pains TRUE but what company hasn't ???? Even Budwieser was illegal at one point.
Times change and soon enough corporations will realize its cheaper to give anyone that wants one a Coca-cola cell-phone that it would be for advertising them so much.....??!!!!!!!! Some day my words will ring in ALL YOUR HEADS =:P Remember you heard it HERE 1st!!
steve @ Sep 3rd 2006 7:35PM
besides the speakerphone not being that loud and the legal music and music videos being expensive and the fact you cant make any songs on your transflash memorycards a ringtone(that i can see) everything else about the hero is pretty good. i was getting 1 bar in my house with t mobile and with helio im getting 4 bars out of 6.
with that said u can also download videos trailers stream tv clips and hell even have animated and moving screens like wormhole on your main screen which is awesome.
overall i give an 8 out of 10.
suggestions i would give is j2me,bluetooth,better graphic processor then hero or kickflip,louder speaker phone and fm radio tuner or internet radio station streaming.then it would truly be awesome.
by the way this phone is right up there with the razr V3X minus the video conferencing.