mobilicity former type subsidiary industry mobile virtual network operator founded 2009 in vaughan ontario founder john bitove defunct 2016 headquarters vaughan ontario products blackberry smartphones wireless data services sms mms hspa including hspa parent rogers communications 1 website mobilicity.ca data and audio visual enterprises wireless d b a mobilicity was a canadian mobile virtual network operator owned by rogers communications . its name is a portmanteau of the words mobility and simplicity . 2 mobilicity was one of several new cellphone providers along with public mobile later acquired by telus and wind mobile later acquired by shaw communications which launched in canada after a government initiative to encourage competition in the wireless sector . the carrier had over 250 000 mobilicity subscriptions on may 16 2013 the day in which telus announced its failed attempt to acquire mobilicity . 3 the subscription count decreased to 157 000 by april 2015 according to court documents filed by mobilicity s chief restructuring officer in that month . 4 on june 24 2015 the ontario superior court gave approval for the sale of mobilicity to rogers for 440 million cad . 5 in may 2016 rogers announced it plans to retire the mobilicity brand and migrate subscribers to its chatr brand . 6 contents 1 history 1.1 2008 2009 early years 1.2 2010 2012 launch and competition 1.3 2013 2015 financial restructuring attempted acquisition deals 1.3.1 telus and wind mobile interest 1.4 2015 acquisition by rogers 1.5 2016 pending shutdown 2 network 2.1 1700 2100 mhz aws 3g 2009 2015 3 products 3.1 feature phones 3.2 smartphones 3.3 internet access devices 4 services 4.1 voice plans 4.2 mobile internet 4.3 roaming 5 criticism 5.1 misleading advertising 5.2 mobile internet policies 5.3 network outages 6 philanthropy 7 advertising 8 retail presence 9 gallery 10 references 11 external links history edit 2008 2009 early years edit originally formed as dave wireless by canadian businessman john bitove the company entered the 2008 spectrum auction for aws frequencies . dave spent 243 million on 10 mhz of aws spectrum blocks largely covering southern and eastern ontario vancouver calgary and edmonton . 7 the domain davewireless.com was registered on july 10 2008 via go daddy . 8 later on october 27 2009 the domain mobilicity.ca was registered via internic.ca and the canadian internet registration authority cira . 9 dave dobbin who had held executive posts at other telecom firms coo of telecom ottawa president of toronto hydro telecom president of cogeco data services was named president and ceo . 2010 2012 launch and competition edit number of mobilicity subscribers 3 4 10 11 date additions total increase 2011 09 30 143 500 2011 12 31 206 500 44 % 2012 05 23 250 000 2012 12 31 271 337 2013 03 30 16 800 254 457 6.22 % 2013 06 31 19 035 235 422 7.48 % 2013 09 30 19 478 215 944 8.27 % 2014 06 31 157 000 2014 08 30 700 156 300 0.45 % 2014 10 31 2 337 158 637 1.47 % 2015 04 30 1 637 157 000 1.03 % dave wireless s website was launched with information on january 7 . 12 the following month on february 2 it was confirmed that the company would operate under the name mobilicity . the company was built to deliver canadians a simple mobile solution . 13 later service was launched to the public on may 15 but only for the city of toronto . on november 17 service was launched in edmonton and vancouver 14 15 and in the ottawa and gatineau area the following day . 16 17 coverage in calgary went live on april 28 2011 . 18 to date this is the last major update to mobilicity s coverage . during q4 2011 mobilicity had a 50 % off sale on all monthly plans . dave dobbin resigned in november 2011 . john bitove assumed the role of executive chairman and commented that dobbin didn t have a consumer background . 19 stewart lyons formerly executive vice president of xm satellite radio canada replaced dobbin as mobilicity s president while bitove assumed the role of executive chairman . mobilicity ended the year with approximately 206 500 subscribers 20 of which 113 000 54 % who activated during q4 of either 2010 or 2011 . 20 several new devices launched at mobilicity during the first half of 2012 . the carrier launched the galaxy nexus its first android 4.0 device on february 2 . this happened one day before competitor wind mobile launched the same phone . mobilicity sold the phone at a 600 retail price but cut it in half to 300 by q3 2012 . the first windows phone sold by mobilicity was the nokia lumia 710 released on may 17 2012 and discontinued in q3 2012 . the blackberry curve 9320 was released on june 6 2012 and the samsung galaxy s iii was released on june 27 2012 . on april 1 mobilicity changed its plans and website which remain available to this day . variants of the 50 % off sale for monthly plans were reintroduced in 2012 during the months of may september november and december . october 2012 saw the addition of 24 month multi month discounts and on october 30 a premium service option for faster mobile broadband . 21 loblaw companies was added as a retail partner . 2013 2015 financial restructuring attempted acquisition deals edit on february 12 2013 mobilicity announced a new multi stage financing deal worth 75 million . of this sum 15 million has already been provided to mobilicity . catalyst capital group however opened a file at an ontario court in an attempt to halt this deal . 22 on april 10 2013 mobilicity announced that it would withdraw from the canadian wireless telecommunications association . competitors public mobile and wind mobile also withdrew from the cwta citing bias in favour of rogers bell and telus as the main factor . 23 on april 26 2013 an order was issued by the ontario superior court of justice allowing mobilicity to attempt restructuring . 24 the court order allows mobilicity to ask creditors to vote on business sale and restructuring plans which contain actions that are intended to help the company raise additional capital and pursue other strategic options . mobilicity announced on july 10 2013 that the company is in discussions with multiple parties in connection with an acquisition plan of arrangement . 25 it was reported in the national post on september 4 2013 that mobilicity was in negotiations to have wind mobile assume their customers while investors retained control of spectrum licenses 26 though this report was later denied by mobilicity . 27 mobilicity initially had an end date of october 30 2013 for its stay period which prohibits proceedings against the applicants or the property . 28 stewart lyons resigned from mobilicity the following day . 29 mobilicity s stay period has since been extended ten times and now carries an end date of august 31 2015 . 4 telus and wind mobile interest edit on may 16 2013 telus announced that it has agreed to acquire mobilicity for 380 million pending regulatory approval . on that day mobilicity had over 250 000 subscribers and 150 employees . 3 30 industry minister christian paradis announced on june 4 2013 that the canadian federal government would prohibit the telus takeover of mobilicity because it would be a violation of the conditions of the 2009 aws spectrum auction . 31 public mobile was acquired by telus on october 23 2013 . telus made a second attempt to acquire mobilicity on april 17 2014 for 350 million . mobilicity stated that they believe the deal will not affect competition in the canadian wireless sector and will satisfy government regulators . 32 33 the competition bureau disagreed with mobilicity s claim and blocked the sale again . telus ultimately terminated its acquisition plans . 34 following the blocking of the proposed telus deal wind mobile then ceo anthony lacavera stated that wind was interested in re opening consolidation discussions with mobilicity . lacavera had called for the consolidation of wind mobile mobilicity and public mobile in the past to better compete with the three major canadian wireless companies a plan rebuffed by both mobilicity and public mobile . 35 after it was announced that american carrier verizon wireless would be putting off and ultimately cancelling a decision on offering to buy wind mobile or mobilicity lacavera announced that in addition to buying back a controlling share of wind mobile he remained interested in purchasing mobilicity . 36 starting in may 2014 wind mobile made several promotions targeted at mobilicity customers . the first was a free month of service for any plan worth up to 60 . 37 in december 2014 following the recapitalization of wind mobile by new investors it offered 60 in service credits and a free sim card to customers porting a number from mobilicity . 38 during january and february 2015 wind offered mobilicity customers a free sim card and six months of free service on the wind35 plan for switching . 39 in february 2015 the financial post reported that wind mobile was in negotiations to take over mobilicity in the weeks leading up to the aws 3 spectrum auction registration deadline . the negotiations had been reportedly stalled due to the high price that mobilicity s creditors were requesting from wind to purchase the smaller carrier s assets . discussions halted on january 30 2015 the application deadline for the spectrum auction and were put on hold until the auction results were announced in march 2015 since both carriers had registered for the auction and anti collusion regulations prohibited any discussion or negotiation of deals between competitors during the auction . 40 2015 acquisition by rogers edit in early june 2015 both telus and rogers communications bid to acquire mobilicity primarily for its wireless spectrum . unlike in previous acquisition attempts industry canada was willing to consider approving a sale of the smaller carrier to one canada s major telecom companies provided that some of mobilicity s aws spectrum licenses were sold or transferred to former competitor wind mobile . 41 on june 23 mobilicity s creditors approved a 440 million deal which would see rogers acquire the entire company while divesting certain spectrum licenses to wind . the acquisition plans were approved by the ontario superior court as overseer of mobilicity s bankruptcy proceedings industry canada and the federal competition bureau on june 24 . 1 2016 pending shutdown edit rogers announced on may 10 2016 that it plans to retire the mobilicity brand and will stop activating new mobilicity lines on august 15 2016 . 6 existing customers plans will not be grandfathered mobilicity subscribers will instead be given a choice of comparable plans when they are migrated to rogers other value brand mobile provider chatr beginning in fall 2016 . rogers also stated it will convert over half of existing mobilicity retail outlets to chatr branding . 42 on july 27 2016 rogers launched the my chatr move website to facilitate mobilicity customers switching to chatr . 43 network edit 1700 2100 mhz aws 3g 2009 2015 edit mobilicity s network was built in 2009 and maintained by ericsson . 44 the company also had a cell site sharing agreement with bell mobility to share cell tower space in all mobilicity zones . 44 on july 3 2012 mobilicity expanded its agreement with ericsson to manage the network . ericsson was responsible for planning engineering and optimizing the network . 45 the network used the umts iv frequency band commonly known as advanced wireless services or aws 1 to provide umts service with hspa data 3g . 46 using this band user equipment transmitted at 1710 1755 mhz and received at 2110 2155 mhz . the same frequencies