Dish Network Corp. has started a trial of its anticipated Boost Infinite mobile phone plan with a $25-a-month lifetime price guarantee designed to lure customers away from the dominant wireless carriers.
(Bloomberg) — Dish Network Corp. has started a trial of its anticipated Boost Infinite mobile phone plan with a $25-a-month lifetime price guarantee designed to lure customers away from the dominant wireless carriers.
The company launched the beta version early Wednesday and plans a full nationwide rollout in the first three months of 2023.
The unusually low price could be a “lightning rod” that jolts the industry toward lower rates, Stephen Stokols, Dish’s executive vice president of retail wireless, said in an interview. Boost Infinite is the Englewood, Colorado-based company’s first postpaid mobile offering and was built to take on larger rivals AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications Inc. and T-Mobile US Inc.
“Customers are price sensitive and looking for areas to cut recurring expenses like wireless bills,” Stokols said. “This is a significant savings.”
The $25 price doesn’t include fees and taxes or any streaming service perks, and speeds will be slowed after a 30-gigabyte cap. Customers must sign up online with a credit card or electronic payment. There will be a “soft check” of the customer’s credit quality as opposed to a lengthy credit application.
Dish is using network-sharing agreements with AT&T and T-Mobile to give Boost Infinite customers nationwide service on almost any mobile phone. It is relying on those competitors while it builds out its own 5G network, which for now can only be accessed with a $900 Motorola Edge+ phone. Additional compatible devices will be available in the first quarter.
Dish said in 2018 it would spend at least $10 billion to build a cloud-based, wireless network. The plans accelerated when the company bought Boost from T-Mobile two years ago. However, the transition to 5G wireless company from satellite-TV provider has been challenging, and it’s faced delays.
The company began rolling out 5G this year to prepaid customers in more than 120 cities, including Las Vegas and Albuquerque, New Mexico.
(Updates with more information about Boost Infinite’s network in the sixth paragraph.)
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