Austrian discount retailer set to enter MVNO market - report

Hofer, the Austrian branch of Aldi, is reportedly entering the mobile market in January with its own mobile service offering. It would replace Yesss!, the MVNO Hofer announced it was dropping last December, although the contract is still valid until the end of this year.

According to reports, Hofer will use T-Mobile Austria’s network, and there has been speculation the new MVNO could be named ‘Hofer Talk’ following the example of the German parent company’s Aldi Talk.

Aldi Talk, also known as MEDIONmobile, has been operating since 2005 in Germany, where it uses the E-Plus network, and is also present in Belgium on Base’s network, the Netherlands (KPN) and Australia (Telstra).

It’s not clear whether Austria, a country with a relatively small population of around 8.5 million people, and a telecom market with already plenty of MVNOs, really needs another. Having said that MVNOs are still popping up even in crowded marketplaces, just like ProSiebenSat.1’s Chixx, launched earlier this month in Germany and aimed specifically at women.

On the other hand, there are still markets with room for new players, such as Romania, where the launch of the country’s first MVNO was only recently announced by LycaMobile, which will establish the service together with Telekom Romania (formerly known as Cosmote Romania).