After leaving my former Nokia smartphone unguarded on its last lines of battery it finally dove into sleep mode. When I realized that the next morning, even after two hours of being plugged in, it wouldn’t come back to life. Bomber! Out comes a loaner as a back up, turns out all my other phones were no where to be found.
The carrier’s office finally opened after Easter week. I went in only to learn that since I’d purchased the phone exactly 1 year and 1 day before, they couldn’t repair it for me. Ahh can you smell the carrier’s golden opportunity? Hint–> (say this with your best whispery voice) Buy a new phone!
Indeed I had to or I’d be stuck with the loaner for who knows how long with the only ability to press the same button a thousand times to get it to send out an sms.
Of course they came right out with an upgrade contract (of course!) More money, new phone but here’s the magic behind all those catches: a limitless internet connection on a purple BlackBerry (yes, you did read purple). Out comes the phone but not alone! It came with + 1; a prepaid (in case you need a loaner when your phone breaks) HuaWei phone. “What’s that?” I asked.
I had never heard or seen that brand before, not even back during my days in China. As I looked more into it afterwards, it’s a chinese brand of mostly USB sticks, just turned into a telecomm company. You have to give it to them though. Excellent way to come in a position themselves in the Mexican market. I bet you nearly no one here has heard about that brand before. Usually the “loaner” prepaid phones they give you for free are Nokia phones.
Has Nokia then lost two battles in such a short period of time? First they start sinking with their phone platform, having to join forces with Microsoft in order to be a Windows 7 carrier and now this? Nokia used to rock the analog phones! Sure thing Nokia has been punched several times (may be even below the belt?). Let’s see how they turn this around.
But for now, I came out of that store with two brands that seem to dominate both ends of the phone spectrum: BlackBerry for smartphones and Huawei for loaners.