From the explosive growth of travel eSIM services to retailers such as Lidl exploring the launch of up to 30 MVNOs across Europe with 1GLOBAL, and digital-first brands like Monzo and Klarna reportedly considering market entry, the future looks bright.

Latest market data reinforces the optimism. Prescient Strategic Insight predicts the global MVNO market will grow from a value of $92 billion today to $155 billion within the next three years. These figures highlight not only the scale of the opportunity but also the pace of innovation and entrepreneurial ambition that continues to drive the industry forward.

Regulators play a significant role

A significant factor behind this expansion is the role regulators are playing in fostering competition and encouraging innovation.

In developing telecommunications markets, where greater consumer choice is needed, regulators are increasingly issuing licences and mandating wholesale network access. 

These measures help create opportunities for new entrants while challenging incumbent operators to sharpen up their efforts and deliver better services, lower prices, and more innovation.

The same trend is evident in mature markets. As network operators continue to consolidate through mergers and acquisitions, regulators frequently look to MVNOs as a mechanism for preserving competition. 

Across several European markets, regulatory remedies have included mandatory MVNO access agreements and, in some cases, regulated wholesale commercial terms. Regulators understand that a well-executed challenger MVNO can transform market dynamics and deliver significant value to consumers.

A compelling example is Walmart’s Bait in Mexico. By leveraging its extensive retail footprint and integrating mobile services with customer loyalty programmes, incentives, and promotions, Bait has achieved an impressive 18% market share. Remarkably, it has surpassed two established mobile network operators in the process. This demonstrates the power of combining a strong brand, customer access, and a differentiated proposition.

Innovation is also emerging in other areas. Honest Mobile, for example, has addressed one of the most persistent frustrations faced by UK consumers: inconsistent network coverage. 

Its solution allows customers to access multiple networks through a single SIM, providing greater reliability and flexibility. It is a simple yet highly effective response to a real consumer problem.

Beyond consumer-focused offerings, there are numerous success stories in the enterprise sector. MVNOs are increasingly being developed to support innovations in IoT, connected devices, and wearable technology. These specialised providers demonstrate that MVNOs can take many forms, serving a wide range of customer needs and business models.

But what unites these success stories is a shared mindset. A belief that existing solutions can be improved. By identifying genuine market gaps and delivering something better, many MVNOs have managed to challenge incumbents and reshape customer expectations.

But you need more than a good idea to succeed

However, having a strong concept is only the beginning. While innovation is essential, it is far from the only ingredient required for success.

Launching an MVNO is a complex undertaking that involves significant commercial, operational, and technical challenges. Successful providers invest heavily in understanding customer behaviour, negotiating competitive wholesale agreements, and designing robust technical architectures capable of delivering on their promises. None of this happens by accident.

The challenges do not end once the service launches. Attracting customers and maintaining momentum in the market requires continuous effort. The idea that simply building a product guarantees customers will come is one of the biggest misconceptions in the industry. Successful MVNOs are restless when it comes to keeping their brand visible, relevant, and compelling.

Travel eSIM opens a new world of MVNO

One of the most exciting growth areas is undoubtedly the travel eSIM market.

Travel eSIM propositions are now being adopted across travel, transportation, retail, and fintech sectors. Their appeal is straightforward: they provide international travellers with simple, affordable connectivity while eliminating expensive roaming charges.

Consumers increasingly view connectivity as an essential travel product, purchased as easily as hire cars or sangria. Travellers actively compare providers and seek the best value, creating opportunities for brands that can deliver attractive, easy-to-understand offers.

The most successful propositions often combine connectivity with complementary travel services. Bundling eSIM packages with competitive foreign exchange rates, digital wallets, or airline bookings creates a seamless customer experience that adds genuine value.

Perhaps more importantly, travel eSIMs serve as an ideal gateway product. They offer new entrants a relatively low-risk route into the telecommunications market while solving a clearly defined customer pain point. 

Once a brand has established trust and demonstrated that customers are willing to buy connectivity services from them, it creates opportunities to expand into more sophisticated primary SIM offerings.

This phased approach enables brands to build customer relationships, refine their propositions, and gradually increase lifetime value. It is a model that we strongly advocate and one that many of our clients are successfully pursuing. 

Even traditional mobile network operators are increasingly investing in travel eSIM solutions, further highlighting the strategic importance of this segment.

Being a winner takes time and energy

For every successful MVNO, there are numerous examples of businesses that failed because they focused on the idea rather than the execution.

Success requires strategic clarity, dedicated resources, and expert guidance throughout the development process. The most important question any prospective MVNO must answer is simple: Why would customers choose our service?

The strongest MVNOs succeed because they solve a genuine customer problem and clearly communicate how their solution differs from existing alternatives.

At Graystone Strategy, we encourage new MVNOs to follow a five-part structured development journey that begins with customer needs and user experience. Without a deep understanding of customer motivations, there is no viable business case. It becomes impossible to accurately forecast costs, margins, growth potential, or operational requirements.

Equally important, operators are unlikely to engage in meaningful wholesale discussions if the strategic foundations are weak. Network operators receive countless partnership proposals, and only those supported by clear commercial logic and market demand stand out.

The subsequent stages we recommend focus on technical delivery and operational execution. While technology is often the most visible aspect of an MVNO launch, it should never overshadow the customer proposition. The best technical solutions are often those that create the simplest and most seamless user experiences.

Always be selling

Finally, long-term success depends on sustaining brand relevance and continuously acquiring customers. Too many businesses underestimate the ongoing investment required to market and grow their proposition. Building awareness and maintaining momentum should never be an afterthought.

This is where expert advice can make all the difference. If you believe you have identified a market opportunity, engage with industry specialists early. Validate the concept, build the business case, and refine the strategy before entering negotiations.

Better still, bring experienced advisors into wholesale discussions and contract negotiations. Their expertise can significantly accelerate the journey to market and improve commercial outcomes. In a sector growing as rapidly as MVNOs, that investment could ultimately determine whether you become part of the industry’s success story or simply another example of what happens when opportunity is not matched by execution.Need help ensuring your idea doesn’t fade after launch? We can help, either with our detailed masterclasses on the steps you need to take, or by becoming an extension of your team, developing go-to-market strategy and proposition development. Contact us to find out more.

The post A good idea for an MVNO is only that. It takes negotiation, execution and dedication to be a success. appeared first on Graystone Strategy.

Haast’s fast gaining traction because its AI powered compliance platform alerts companies to risk of legal breaches and compliance bottlenecks when completing business tasks such as preparing and agreeing contracts, through to developing content and marketing campaigns. It’s designed to be multi-language and work across highly regulated industries including telecoms, utilities, pharma and finance. 

This disruptive approach to using AI for compliance has helped it win numerous Fortune 500 companies and international brands including Telstra, Aviva, and Zurich.

Building a channel partnership pipeline

Under the terms of the partnership, James Gray, managing director of Graystone Strategy, and Paul Jefferies, associate client director, will use their global expertise in go-to-market strategy and segmentation in the telecoms industry and parallel sectors to help Haast expand into the fixed and mobile sector, and related industries such as utilities and mobile phone insurance. 

“We’re excited to be working with Haast, which is fast becoming the leader in AI compliance management in complex, regulated sectors. Haast’s growth trajectory shows a strong appetite among business leaders to use its platform to transform how they operate,” said James Gray, managing director of Graystone Strategy. 

“Haast’s innovative platform is designed to provide an extra pair of hands for in-house legal teams, accelerating the parts of the compliance process that slow them down. The result is a legal function that can move at the pace of the business – without compromising on regulatory commitments.”

Paul Jefferies, associate client director at Graystone Strategy, explains why telecoms is a prime candidate for distribution: “Our goal is to help Haast build partnerships in the telco market. Telecoms is a prime example of a fast-paced, complex and regulated industry that must constantly find ways to unlock more efficiency and stay ahead of the competition.”

“We think Haast will give telcos the capability to do more in less time, and will be especially useful for organisations that can’t afford more legal resources, despite recognising its value to their business,” Paul concludes.

Haast’s platform offers UK businesses an efficient, scalable way to ensure that compliance doesn’t hinder growth, as Wessel Van Keulen, Founding AE Europe at Haast explains: “Our platform can support legal processes in every facet of a business and cuts compliance review time by 80%. We’ve proven you can increase an existing team’s capability using AI and as a result, grow the business without putting compliance at risk.” 

“That’s why we are excited to work with Graystone Strategy to expand our reach in the UK,” Wessel adds. “The team’s deep understanding of the regulatory landscape and its expertise in go to market strategy will be invaluable as we scale our business growth and bring the benefits of AI-driven compliance to a wider telco audience.”

Business leaders interested in discussing how Haast can help drive AI compliance solutions for their business should contact the Graystone Strategy team at enquiries@graystone-strategy.com.  

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We’re starting to see satellite take off in countries around the work where regulators are granting permission.

Top of mind is the UK, where, following Ofcom approval O2 Satellite is first out the blocks with its Starling backed services, and Vodafone has inked a deal with AST Space Mobile. In the US, Skylo, Verizon’s direct-to-device (D2D) partner, is the latest name to be seeking FCC approval for services to support IoT, smartphones and wearables.

The post The Art of the Wholesale Deal: Negotiate, renegotiate, grow appeared first on Graystone Strategy.

The post 1 Year On: How Has the VodafoneThree Merger Changed the Market? appeared first on Graystone Strategy.

In terms of strategy, no. I think we could see it from a mile away. Timing wise, yes. To do it a year on from officially merging two brands was sooner than I, and no doubt markets and analysts, had expected. 

The deal is made up of a £4.3m cancellation of shares and an anticipated £700m cost and CAPEX saving. A decent chunk of change in anyone’s book.

This will be realised by bringing the 100% owned company into the Vodafone Group and leveraging ‘synergies’ and, undoubtedly benefits from technical consolidation.

There are other upsides. The big one being it will neutralise the political concerns about Chinese ownership of critical infrastructure. This is likely to sit well with large enterprise too.

Yesterday, I was asked if I thought this would trigger additional CMA interest.

My gut reaction is that it won’t. There is no real change for consumers, and you could argue that consumers will do better out of the leveraging of intra Vodafone Group benefits. 

Plus, originally there were some substantial competition remedies on the table to ensure consumer and wholesale competition remains at a level comfortable for the CMA.

Which leads me to unpacking another anniversary present / question. One year on, how effective have the remedies been?

Avid readers of my blogs during the run up to, and announcement of the merger will know that remedies were as follows:

1. Investment plan of £11bn to create the largest 5G SA network. This had to be delivered in 8 years with key milestones over that period.
2. Special tariffs that were identified as good value for cash challenged households must be retained for 3 years (2 years left now).
3. A commercial deal was done to allow the merged entity to remain in the site sharing agreement with O2, which involved O2 buying some spectrum from Vodafone Three.
4. A regulator wholesale reference offer was approved, the aim being to maintain competition in wholesale markets. Existing MVNOs also benefitted from some wholesale carve out.

So, has it been successful? At a general level, I would say the UK market is still competitive. The Three brand is still trading and advertising, and as a consumer I haven’t seen a massive price hike, above the usual inflationary increases that the MNOs level (MVNOs not so much). 

I am a Vodafone customer and have been since I started working for them in 2002, and overall I think I have seen improvements in coverage locally through the network sharing and deployment of MOCN.

We haven’t seen the massive MVNO bonanza as I was expecting. But then it’s only been a year.

But, we have seen launches mostly via MVNAs such as eSIMGo, Gigs and Gamma. This includes brands such as Zim, Tekmoni, Rocket mobile, Millwall and other football brands.

In terms of larger multinationals, Gigs has enabled Revolut on Vodafone Three, which is part of a broader mobile strategy across multiple markets. Interestingly, Revolut has used 1Global in other markets so there is healthy competition in Europe.

And we shouldn’t forget the 1Global deal with Lidl which is expected to bring up to 30 MVNOs globally. The UK is likely to be one market that Lidl seeks to build on its increasing grocery market share (8.5%) and a region where it can also integrate its loyalty app.

There have also been a large number of announcements of intent to launch, including AO, Monzo, Klarna and Netonmia.

Part of the remedies include the expectation that Vodafone Three will send an annual report to the CMA detailing progress against milestones and demonstrate that remedies are working as expected. We wait to see what comes out. 

Overall, I would say the wholesale market in the UK is still busy. Large brands are interested and 12 months is really early days, albeit we have used a third of the 3-year window for remedies. 

I would say the next 6-12 months are going to be critical and I am forecasting more, larger brands coming to market, which I’ll report on as they happen. 

So, all that remains to be said is ‘Happy birthday Vodafone Three’! Some surprises but largely expected performance.

The Graystone Strategy team is the official training partner at the MVNOs World congress, where we will deliver three masterclasses on all aspects of delivering a successful MVNO. They are free for conference attendees so be sure to secure your slot. And if you need help determining your MVNO strategy in the wake of this announcement, drop me a line. We’re always happy to give some initial advice. 

The post Vodafone Three’s buy out is no surprise, but what happens for MVNOs could be.  appeared first on Graystone Strategy.

Launching a retail MVNO is, of course, not a new idea. We’ve seen this happen all over the world. But I think it’s the scale that is breathtaking. It’s a huge statement of strategic intent from both sides, and a reminder that retail MVNOs remain one of the most powerful, and, in my opinion, underutilised, growth levers. 

Lidl’s ambition to leverage its retail footprint in multiple countries, combines ingredients successful retail MVNOs boast, including the option to distribute at scale and capitalise on high levels of consumer trust. 

Coupled with access to 1Global’s digital expertise, Lidl is on the road to creating a compelling mobile proposition that can be set directly into the retail experience.

The case for retail MVNOs

Looking back over the last five years, MVNO performance has rocketed and, in some countries, MVNOs post better growth than their operator hosts.  

Close to home, retail MVNOs account for over 40% of all MVNO subscribers in the UK. Tesco Mobile alone has over 5 million subscribers and has successfully expanded into Ireland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia. 

Alongside it, brands like Asda Mobile, iD Mobile (from Currys), Coop Mobile, and Superdrug Mobile are showing that a close bond between the mobile and retail experience pays off. 

You don’t even have to be trading with shops either, as proved by AO’s announcement last June, that it too will launch an MVNO very soon. 

Internationally, the success stories are just as compelling. The standout example is the market disruptor Bait, Walmart’s MVNO in Mexico. It’s seen extraordinary growth and now holds the number two spot in market share, outperforming two established network operators. 

On the other side of the world, Aeon in Japan, and Woolworths in Australia, are great examples of retail MVNOs that work because they already had so many of the ingredients critical for a successful retail MVNO. 

So why do retail MVNOs work?

Having worked across multiple retail MVNOs, including iD in Ireland, Coop Mobile in the UK and Channel Islands, Asda Mobile, Superdrug Mobile, and even the now-retired Mobile by Sainsbury’s, I’ve seen firsthand what separates the successes from the also-rans.

It comes down to a few critical factors.

1. Unmatched customer access

The first, and arguably most important advantage is customer access.

Retailers like Asda and Tesco have tens of millions of customers passing through their stores every week. That level of engagement dwarfs what traditional mobile operators can achieve. Mobile is a low-frequency interaction; grocery retail is often weekly, if not more.

Retailers also typically enjoy significantly higher Net Promoter Scores (NPS) than telecom operators. In simple terms, customers like supermarkets more and are willing to switch to them for their mobile.

2. Low customer acquisition costs and high lifetime value

Retailers with stores are perfectly placed to convert footfall into SIM sales at a fraction of the cost incurred by traditional operators. They have the space in store to allocate to sales either as concessions, or SIM displays at checkouts, and the staffing is taken care of. Plus, with a steady stream of customers through the door, there’s no need for expensive above the line marketing campaigns to drive awareness and footfall.

This dramatically lowers customer acquisition cost (CAC) and gives retailers the flexibility to invest more in customer offers such as bigger data bundles, better loyalty rewards, and / or compete aggressively on price. 

Retail MVNOs perform exceptionally well on key metrics like margin per square foot. I’ve seen how a small footprint in-store can generate disproportionately high lifetime value (CLV), especially when compared to the relatively thin margins on everyday grocery items.

3. Integration with loyalty

The real magic, however, lies in integration. The most successful retail MVNOs don’t treat mobile as a standalone product. They embed it into the broader shopping experience. This is where many weaker propositions fall.

When mobile is linked to loyalty schemes, member pricing, or exclusive discounts, it becomes far more compelling. Customers aren’t just buying a SIM, they’re unlocking additional value with a retailer they already engage with and trust.

And the benefits are felt both ways. Mobile drives retail, and retail drives mobile. As not only does the MVNO generate incremental, recurring monthly revenue, but it also drives the core retail business. 

Some of the best retail MVNOs I’ve seen, incentivise customers to increase their visits to store, and how much they spend using loyalty point accelerators, discounts, and vouchers. This results in significantly higher retail basket spend and improved customer loyalty.

4. Customer perception is king

Trail blazers like Tesco and Aldi Talk legitimised retail MVNOs 20+ years ago and won over generations of consumers who only grew up with the option of a big operator. The latest generation of mobile users have never known a market without MVNOs. The net result is that brand loyalty to MNOs has waned, and there’s a readiness to switch to brands that are not traditionally associated with telecoms. 

Lidl and 1GLOBAL make for a winning combination 

Lidl knows it can achieve the same results. It brings enormous scale, a strong value-led brand, and a growing digital and loyalty capability, and when blended with 1GLOBAL’s technical infrastructure and international reach, they’ll be able to execute across multiple markets. 

And, dare I say, with brands like Revolut in the 1GLOBAL stable who knows where Lidl could branch out to. Banking and financial services is also a fast growth MVNO segment. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a longer-term strategy there. 

Whatever the future holds, for now they have the ingredients for a highly competitive retail MVNO proposition, and it should prompt other retailers, especially in the UK, to stop and think. 

There are plenty of brands with the scale, loyal customer base and infrastructure to make a retail MVNO work. Morrisons More, Boots and its Advantage card, and the various Co-operative groups, spring to mind as contenders. Even Sainsbury’s, despite the previous exit of Mobile by Sainsbury’s, could revisit the opportunity, particularly given the strength of the Nectar scheme today. 

Given the grocery market is so competitive and the challenger brands are not only taking share and winning the price wars but now sharpening their focus on growth through MVNOs, it would seem fool hardy for other retailers to be complacent.  

In my view, this will spark the next wave of retail MVNOs. Because when one retailer moves, others follow. 

20 years ago, retail MVNOs felt like a risk. Why would a brand take money from the business to invest in an unproven model, when you could build another store, refurbish one to add new product line or even buy a competitor?

But now the numbers stack up. The model is proven, with global success stories and strong underlying economics. We talk about their merit every year at MVNOs World because they work. Not only that, MVNOs work hard for their parent brands. 

For retailers sitting on the sidelines, the question isn’t whether this model works. It’s whether they can afford not to be part of the next generation of retail MVNOs. Those that dally, genuinely risk losing out to competitors on both customer numbers and incremental revenue.

So, if you want to be part of the new era but need help with the proposition, the business case, technology choices, or wholesale contract, then Graystone Strategy can help. Our team have negotiated and launched many successful retail MVNO and are perfectly placed to get your strategy off the ground. To get in touch click here.

You can also book a face-to-face meeting with us at MVNOs World, June 1-3^rd in Amsterdam here.

The post Could the Lidl 1GLOBAL MVNO announcement signal a new wave of retail MVNO growth in Europe?  appeared first on Graystone Strategy.

As stories go, this is significant for the market and indicates the growth potential of operator sub-brands and MVNOs right now, even in a busy market like the UK’s. 

BT ditched an excellent multi-brand strategy

BT has been here before. At peak success, the stable included BT, EE, and Plusnet. The three brands represented three distinct opportunities to acquire more ‘traditional’ consumers (BT), to the more edgy and young (EE), to those prepared to go with a market challenger (Plusnet). But after a brand review last year EE became the lead consumer brand for fixed and mobile and Plusnet lost mobile from it’s portfolio.

The original multi-brand strategy worked as BT, EE and Plusnet not only reached high numbers of consumers across different segments, but they also supported a multi-play strategy of fixed, broadband and mobile, something the other operator sub-brands such as SMARTY, giffgaff and Voxi could not offer at the time.

But as we know, things change, resulting in BT walking away from a multi-play, multi-brand strategy and losing its low cost mobile offer in doing so.

Time for a rethink

This week’s news indicates times have changed again, and a sizable rethink is going on. BT’s hand is somewhat forced as successful MVNOs and sub-brands reign strong, especially in the value end of the sector.

The driving question is: how will BT tap into the ‘value’ space and compete against sub-brands like SMARTY, giffgaff, Talkmobile and Voxi? It’s done it before with Plusnet, afterall. 

These challengers are all winning share, alongside MVNOs like Tesco, iD Mobile, and Lebara – none of which are on the BT network. Not to mention Sky, which has a great multi-play offer in the market.

Top of the strategic imperatives is to establish if BT should build or buy. 

Acquiring an MVNO with brand recognition, established infrastructure and customers, will be very appealing to get the job done quickly. But why go down that route when you could build a sub-brand with your own infrastructure? 

Let’s look at the pros and cons of both.

Setting up a sub-brand is common practice today. UK examples include Voxi, SMARTY, giffgaff and Talk Mobile but the phenomena is established throughout mature markets.  

It allows you to choose and build a proposition that is 100% complementary to your other brands. It allows you to have total control and leverage some of your network economies of scale.

BUT it takes time to set up, comes with the hefty costs of developing and launching a brand, and, if you seek to leverage too much of the existing ‘masterbrand’ infrastructure, or the skills working within the masterbrand, you can start to stifle the entrepreneurial spirit that a successful sub-brand needs.

Stepping back to a time when sub-brands weren’t a thing, operators only had the option of wholesale deals to find complementary MVNO partners that allowed the MNO to indirectly take share of a customer segment they could not address with the masterbrand.

The alternative approach has always been to find MVNOs which will address segments where the operator masterbrand is not strong. This allows the operator to indirectly target the segments through the MVNO and take their value through wholesale revenues.

But, and it’s a big but, operators don’t control the brand, it comes without the full retail revenues or customer ownership and they don’t set the proposition or pricing. This can be uncomfortable to mobile network operators, because without a level of control it’s hard to stop the MVNO drifting into your lane, and risk no longer being complementary.

Buy an established brand or a fledgling?

The speculation that an acquisition is in the offing, suggests BT has done its homework on all of this and has arrived at a crossroads – a) ‘buy’ an established brand with a large base and then supercharge the operations with MNO capital or b) buy a brand based on its potential. 

We have seen this done in France and Spain extensively over the last few years with a host of operators buying up and integrating MVNOs into a multi-brand portfolio.

BT obviously has significant financial resources so has options. I expect the board will first investigate an acquisition from within its existing wholesale portfolio. These MVNOs are already integrated into BT and the majority of BT’s portfolio (except Lyca) are light MVNOs meaning no SIM swap, and potential customer churn, should BT acquire them.

So what are immediate the options to acquire? It’s a very short list:

• Utility Warehouse offers a good base, a very unique and sticky low cost offer and it’s multi-play. But this presents a bigger question: would BT want to buy the whole business – gas and energy etc too?

• There’s 1p Mobile, the spin off from Utility Warehouse. It’s low cost but would it feel like a credible competitor to SMARTY, Voxi etc?

• Lyca is probably the organisation with the most subscribers and therefore appears a good prospect. BT Wholesale lured the brand away from O2 and it could make sense to go a step further given it’s already hosted on its own infrastructure.

However, BT might not consider it an optimal partner in that Lyca’s heritage is in the low cost international markets not domestic. 

Although Lebara has successfully proven moving from low cost international to a value brand can be done, it’s taken a long time and BT may not have the appetite to commit to a lengthy process with Lyca. There’s also the risk that any acquisition would inherit the long running HMRC dispute.

• Spusu may be an option. Low cost and already doing well against the SMARTY-style brands on Uswitch comparison tables. It signed with BT in 2023 and uses BT infrastructure, and, although an international operation, it may consider spinning off a brand in the UK.

• And then there is the relatively new wild card, Slice. It’s a sub-brand run by Lyca on an existing BT wholesale deal. It boasts a unique proposition and has an excellent user experience. I am a customer myself, albeit only as a back up SIM, but if I was buying for capability then Slice is where I would start my conversations. 

It also has the advantage that the CMA probably wouldn’t scrutinize a purchase too much, given the relatively low customer numbers involved. And let’s be frank, who would have the energy for another protracted merger discussion….

• If I wanted to be wild, I could suggest that with BT’s financial assets they could go BIG and buy on the scale of Revolut, taking the brand into a whole new area. 

This is of course huge speculation on my part. I have no inside track on any of the ideas I’ve mentioned. 

But, it’s got you thinking, hasn’t it? And that’s why I love telecoms. There is always something exciting going on. As ever, we’ll need to watch, listen and learn. 

Need help with your MVNO strategy. Talk to the experts. My team knows the industry inside out and can help you look at the options.

The post BT’s in the market for a low cost brand. What are the acquisition options? appeared first on Graystone Strategy.

Keeping it simple with a £20 monthly plan, is a clear message to the industry that it means business and wants to join the mobile and MVNO revolution. I really do think this a big statement of intent and worth reflecting on, especially if you’re at the helm of a high street bank. 

I think it underlines a pivotal trend in banking and mobile, and any high street incumbent that doesn’t have a plan, could be left for dust. 

Super app generation comes into play

When Reuters reported the news, it referred to the ‘super app’ ecosystems that neo and digital banks are creating. It’s something we have been tracking for a while at Graystone Strategy – you may recall my blog on Revolut.

I think Revolut is one of the best examples of a brand that is successfully extending its value to the customer by diversifying, in the shape of eSIMs for VIP customers. 

Revolut has a loyal customer base that likes using digital services to manage their money when abroad. This makes the strategy to pursue other services a ‘no brainer’. Revolut customers want an alternative to paying the all too often confusing and hefty roaming rates, so why wouldn’t they buy an eSIM that is super flexible? 

What’s telling, is the scale and speed of growth. 600,000 people have taken up the service, marking a significant step on the road to evolving the brand into an MVNO in Europe.

We’ll see more plays like this in the coming year – Monzo, which has 13million banking users, announced in August that it intends to join the pack, whilst Klarna has big plans in the US. 

None of this is happening by accident. 

At the risk of repeating myself, I think we’re witnessing a global phenomenon with banking and financial institutions across the globe identifying the opportunity to grow revenue, improve retention and loyalty, and improve efficiency by selling more to the existing customer base.

Initially, the movement started with banks in Africa leveraging their physical footprint to make it easier for people to transfer money and access ‘micro’ loans. 

Equitel in Kenya led the way and pioneered the MVNO, whilst Vodafone and Safaricom launched a banking service, M-PESA. They all set the bar for solving acute problems for African communities and the innovators in finance and mobile haven’t looked back. 

Trust is at the heart of things 

The disruptive model we’ve seen in Africa worked then, and continues to work today, because the brands involved are trusted. And it’s trust that sits at the heart of the new MVNO phenomenon. 

If you trust a bank with your money, then you’ll trust them to deliver a mobile service. Throw digitalisation and eSIM into the mix and you have the perfect set of ingredients for redefining a market. 

I also think, in general, banking brands are good at selling multiple services. Cross selling current accounts, mortgages, savings, insurance, loans, travel money is the norm, so adding an additional service, such as your mobile connectivity, to the portfolio makes for a simple and cost-effective way to drive revenue and margins.

Yet, if that’s true, why have none of the UK’s leading high street banks joined in? 

There’s certainly scope when you look at the customer numbers. Barclays has 48m customers compared to Metro that has 3million. 

So, if it’s not the size of the base that’s preventing a strategic move, what is holding them back? I suspect that answer is related to the technology constraints and I can see why that could be argued. 

Given many of the banks on the high street have been around for hundreds of years, the technology they will be using will be clunky to say the least. Hard to mould and likely to encourage risk. Whereas in comparison, neo banks, like Monzo, are more agile with digital tech stacks that are easier to develop, manage and integrate with mobile. 

These numbers illustrate the point well: Metro has got 3million users on its app each month, while Starling bank has 2.4million monthly users (from a base of 4million). In contrast HSBC, with 42milion customers, has only got 3.8million using the app monthly.  

Are risk averse companies also shy to mobile integrations?

It would be reasonable to infer that large and complex projects are not what risk averse institutions want to pursue, or that its customers don’t want the digital service. But I think that’s a misnomer. It is possible to move people into digital, and it’s equally as possible create new brands, using legacy stacks when you use the right technology partners. I’ve done it and there’s a whole industry dedicated to taking these very headache away. 

Tech companies of the MVNA / MVNE variety, all over the world, have developed solutions that will plug new into old, at scale and crucially they will do it compliantly.   

And don’t forget, it’s not like neo banks are developing the mobile infrastructure themselves. They too use MVNAs and MVNEs to support their mobile launches, and companies like Gigs (used by Lendable) offer simple API access to systems. It’s proof that it is perfectly doable with the right ambition and proposition. 

If established banks were to tap into the MVNO ecosystem, they’d soon realise the potential for growth, and understand there are MVNO experts like Graystone, that can help set up and run an MVNO – from finding a tech stack partner to developing propositions that work, to using insight to keep a brand fresh and relevant. In short, the MVNO industry is full of talent, and if banks tapped into just a small part of it, they’d fly. 

Of course, the business model must also stack up. 

There’s good reason to take a look. Firstly, there’s a market ready to switch. Research from Enders Analysis (2024), showed that UK MVNOs, including Tesco Mobile and Lebara gained 1.6 million customers, while the four largest traditional operators recorded a net loss of 180,000 subscribers.

The economics are worth exploring too. Mobile is a relatively small proportion of monthly outgoings yet considered a very valuable service by its users. That’s a big plus for any brand that wants to create a ‘sticky’ service. 

Conversely, in the highly regulated banking world, selling more banking services is costly, and highly competitive. Yet if banks offered mobile as an incentive to take multiple banking products, then I think it’s feasible to unlock the door to more long-term customer value. 

You can picture the pitch: “Got a current account, take advantage of our exclusive mortgage rates… and then our exclusive savings rates on ISAs, and why not take unlimited mobile too?”

This formula of multi-product, progressive discounting has worked very well for brands like Utility Warehouse and it’s a model that suits the banking world. If you need any more convincing about how telecoms can help grow a business, then look into the rumour that Octopus, which owns Octopus Energy, is also considering its telecoms strategy.

Banks need to move now

But the reason why banks do or don’t launch mobile services is, frankly, immaterial. Bottom line, if banks don’t consider mobile, then it’s clear their neo competitors will. For any banking brand grappling with making itself relevant to the latest generation of consumer, it makes sense to think about digital and mobile services NOW. 

Because, let’s face it, if banks don’t take on the challenge of adapting to the future and diversify the offer, then they will likely go the way of Blockbuster and Kodak. These brands became irrelevant as digital became the norm. History will repeat itself as AI and virtual solutions come to the fore. We don’t need a crystal ball to reach that prediction. 

So, if you’re working in a bank and reading this, thinking ‘we need to get our strategy sorted’, then I urge you to act on the thought. We can help. We’ve done it numerous times before, all around the world, so we can help you enjoy success too. Just drop me a message and we’ll get you a plan. 

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And now, both will have telecom brands in common, as the headlines across the tech press show. Yes, the new kid on the MVNO block is Mr Beast, real name Jimmy Donaldson.

 “Mr Beast could cause trouble for TMobile and Verizon.”

“Mr Beast’s Wackiest Challenge Yet: Launching a Phone Company.”

“MrBeast’s Mobile Phone Ambition Could Rival Reynolds, Trump Family Ventures”

Not so whacky 

It falls against a backdrop of past success for other big name personalities. Ryan Reynold’s Mint Mobile is often hotly discussed as a model to emulate. In a nutshell, it capitalised on the critical ingredients new MVNOs need. A good, fair, simple pricing model and a strong brand, in this case, backed by the caché of a superstar founder.

This week’s stories about Mr Beast’s intentions read as a sensational move. It’s a surprise that the YouTube superstar, who has around 430million subscribers, would dare to launch a mobile company. Yet, to anyone in the industry (especially those twice the age of the 27-year-old) it’s a no brainer.

Why does it make sense?

There is of course a lot to get right when launching a new mobile brand. You must have the right wholesale agreements in place, a great proposition and a simple way for users to purchase, activate and manage an account. Above all, MVNOs must be different to everything else on the market, and be ready to spend on marketing, especially when no one has ever heard of you before.  

Mr Beast has a head start with regards to many of those ingredients. A huge global reach negates the need for the level of marketing and spend other brands would need to stump up. The scale of the audience provides the channel to market and simply equates to a huge revenue potential. This gives Donaldson significant bargaining power at the table, so getting the right deals for launch shouldn’t be too hard.

Should MNOs be worried?

There’s very little existing operators (MNO or MVNO) can do to bolster their brands from the ripples, or more likely, bow waves, that will come from a launch by a mega star of this ilk. 

And let’s face it, the first time mobile users who are joining the market, ones that have grown up with YouTube, might not even consider another provider for their mobile. That’s something MNOs and MVNOs alike will need to face up to.

MNOs might want to ensure they have a chance to be the wholesale provider though – think of the revenue! 

It won’t all be plain sailing

That said, launching an MVNO with global reach comes with challenges. Maintaining a great brand experience across multiple markets is top of the watch list. It’s operationally complex, with a multitude of different mobile wholesale deals to manage, and different regulatory regimes to negotiate.

I’ve seen this be the downfall in many scaling MVNOs. It takes meticulous knowledge and care to get right. It’s not impossible, but you certainly can’t blunder in thinking your superstar brand status will do all the talking.

There’s also the acute point that mobile is competitive. You can’t launch and hope things will look after themselves. The money might roll in to begin with, but if there’s an ounce of dissatisfaction, or a failure to give people special treats for their loyalty, then things will unravel.

Mr Beast will need a team that can keep innovating on proposition, so his audience stays hooked. Look at the effort MVNO football clubs go to, day in day out, to keep their users ‘sticky’. It takes everything from free content, special merch, and access to insider knowledge or early tickets sales that other fans can’t get, to keep people on the network.

Potential for a Mint-Ryan-Reynolds-style sale

If Mr Beast can deliver on this, then he probably not only has a successful business but also a brand he could sell to an MNO (or other digital darling) that needs to grow its portfolio and access a market it wouldn’t otherwise be able to reach. Ryan Reynolds’ Mint Mobile was successfully sold for a reported $1.35billion, so why not Jimmy’s?

Should Trump Ventures be worried?

Personally, I think Trump Ventures’ mobile ambitions will be unaffected by this news. The overlap on target audience is probably limited, and Mr Beast joining the competitive fray won’t be the thing that influences how successful Trump Mobile is. (You can see a blog on wrote about this earlier in the year here.)

Fortune favours the brave

All things considered, and if everything aligns for launch in 2026, then I think the Mr Beast brand has made a brilliant decision. The brand value, breadth and energy has the potential to make a fortune.

However, as I said before, picking the right markets, negotiating the right pricing and putting in place the right proposition is where the magic lies. So, if you are reading this, Mr Beast, don’t be a stranger. I’ll help you get what you need for world domination!

Drop me a WhatsApp on +447766244962

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