The new cellular provider Partner, which operates the Orange Network (054), today announced the complete operation of the network, including rates, services and points of sale. The company announced an unusual rate plan called "Personal Orange", in which there is a price for each amount of usage minutes per month. The price includes payment to the other service providers, payment for various value-added services, insurance, warranty and subscription fees.
Company vice president for marketing Yaakov Kedmi, called on every Cellcom or Pelephone customer to examine his own bill and find out how much he would end up paying to the Orange Network for the same usage minutes. According to Kedmi, in every instance, Partner is cheaper.
A preliminary check run by "Globes" of existing bills, with various numbers that exploit various monthly amounts of usage minutes, indicates that Partner’s prices are between Cellcom’s lowest prices and Pelephone’s highest prices. The examination was random, without a statistically representative sample, and individual users may find different results. The conclusion from this examination is that Partner positioned itself between Cellcom and Pelephone in price, as expected.
A Partner client who uses 90 minutes per month, will pay NIS 157 including VAT. 240 minutes will cost NIS 269, and 420 minutes will cost NIS 381. 600 monthly minutes will cost NIS 489, 900 minutes per month amount to NIS 668. According to the examination, as the number of minutes increases, the price gap in favor of Cellcom against Pelephone increases, in comparison to Partner’s prices.
Published by Israel's Business Arena December 31, 1998