Hutchison Whampoa's Austrian unit has finally unveiled its new look following the €1.3 billion ($1.7 billion) acquisition of Orange Austria in January, in a move that also marks the disappearance of the Orange brand from the Austrian market.
Calling itself "Das Neue Drei," or "the new Three," 3 Austria this week unveiled a new brand presence and Internet portal, and claimed it has taken the best of 3 and Orange to create its new tariff and product portfolio. The combined network of the two operators has also been dubbed "MegaNetz."
Reuters notes that 3 Austria has retained Orange Austria's former low-cost SIM-only tariff of €7.50 per month, which includes 1,000 minutes, 1,000 texts and 1 GB of data. The company, which has said it wants to raise its market share to 30 per cent from a current 24 per cent, also said it would offer a bonus payment of €100 to any customer signing a new contract.
The new tariff ranges are called HalloSIM for SIM-only plans; Hallo for voice and data tariffs with data volumes of up to 6 GB for €40 a month; Hui for mobile broadband plans, including limited data allottments at LTE speeds; and Nimm3 for prepaid plans.
Other value-added services are available as bolt-on plans, including mobile TV and cloud storage services.
"Former Orange as well as existing 3 customers benefit considerably from Das Neue Drei," Rudolf Schrefl, 3 Austria's chief commerical officer, sai din a statement. "The new world of 3 offers all 3.3 million customers something that is both new and familiar, and all potential new customers a dynamic, high-quality and affordable alternative to traditional domestic mobile services."
The comibnation of 3 Austria and Oraneg Austria competes with Telekom Austria's A1 and T-Mobile Austria in one of the most hard-fought markets in Europe.
For more:
- see this 3 Austria release (translated via Google Translate)
- see this Reuters article
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