Virgin Mobile Plans
Virgin Mobile is a mobile phone service provider brand that operates in the United Kingdom as well as United States, South Africa, India, France, Canada, and Australia. In 1999, the first Mobile Virtual Network Operator in the world was launched by Virgin Mobile in United Kingdom. Virgin Mobile is the telecommunications subsidiary of Sir Richard Branson's Virgin Group of Companies.
Virgin Mobile Australia
Sir Richard Branson, owner of the Virgin Group of Companies, noticed that the world of telecommunications in Australia is dominated by companies with long contracts, small prints, and expensive products. On the 31st of October 2000, Virgin Mobile UK and Optus joined forces to launch the latest addition to the Virgin Mobile group: the Virgin Mobile Australia. Virgin Mobile Australia is considered to be the first Mobile Virtual Network Operator in Australia. After Optus refused the injection of additional cash to the Virgin Mobile Australia operations in 2002, Virgin Mobile UK bought additional company shares to increase its shareholding to over 74%. In January 2006, however, Optus bought back all the shares in the company and made Virgin Mobile Australia a subsidiary of Optus. Virgin Mobile Australia was then merged with Optus' SIMplus. The company continues to trade under the Virgin brand due to an ongoing long-term licensing agreement.
Virgin Mobile Products and Services
The outstanding products of Virgin Mobile Australia include prepaid mobile phones, postpaid mobile phones, CAP plans, Long Expiry V2V plans, Phone on Us plans, Message Monster and Motor Mouth plans, and Bean Counter. Bean Counter, Virgin Mobile Australia's online-only prepaid product, won the Best of the Best Gold Medal for Low-User plans of the Australian Money Magazine in 2007.
The services of Virgin Mobile Australia are available in mobile phones such as Samsung, Nokia, LG, and Sony Ericsson. The mobile phone products of Virgin Mobile Australia contain modern telecommunications features that include Java games, ringtones, short message service (SMS), multimedia messaging service (MMS), voicemail, mobile phone calls, international calls, and global roaming. The Virgin Mobile Australia 3G service that features mobile web browsing services was launch in April 2007. Virgin Broadband Australia, the service that offers broadband and fixed phone services via the Optum 3G network, was launched in August 2007.
