Following up on its elimination of subsidies and simplification of postpaid subscriber plans, Verizon will now offer five tiered prepaid plans for tablets and mobile hotspots, the carrier announced Friday.
The plans, which are available on 3G and 4G-enabled tablets and mobile broadband devices, are interestingly divided into weekly, monthly and bi-monthly options. Among the plan offerings are 500 MB of data for $15 per week, 1 GB of data for $35 per month, 2 GB of data for $35 over two months, 5 GB of data for $60 over two months and 10 GB of data for $100 over two months.
Customers taking advantage of the new offerings will be able to enroll in Auto Pay, and may purchase extra data as necessary. With no contract, there is no obligation to continue the plans each month.
The plans are similar to other data-only plans offered by Verizon’s U.S. competitors. T-Mobile’s no-contract Simple Choice plan offers plan options of 1GB to 11 GB of data for $20 to $70 per month, with rollover of unused data and unlimited music streaming. Sprint also offers data-only plans ranging from 100 MB of data for $10 per month through 30 GB of data for $110 per month, while AT&T offers data-only options for tablets that run from 250 MD of data for $15 per month through 5GB of data for $50 per month.
The move comes amid Verizon’s efforts to rebrand itself, which have included the initiation of a #WhyNotWednesday campaign in August that seeks to highlight “the latest in music, sports, fashion, entertainment and technology” and the unveiling of a new logo at the start of September.
The new data plan offerings may also be a tactic to boost viewership on the carrier’s new Go90 mobile video app, which launched at the start of October. The service, which debuted at #14 among iOS entertainment apps, has since fallen out of the top 100 in that category. As of Monday afternoon, Go90 was ranked #103 among iOS entertainment apps and #21 among media and video apps in the Google Play store.
