Sonera and iPhone: why esclusivity is not good for consumers

Sonera Finland is the only operator with rights to distribute the new Apple iPhone 3G in Finland. And this is not good for Finnish consumers.

Sonera is offering 3 different pricing levels (small, medium, large) for the iPhone+service combination. They also offer an extra option that gives people the chance to personalize more the subscription package they are buying from. As part of the deal the customer gets an iPhone at a certain price that depends on the package and the model (8 or 16 GB), but in all cases the phone will be operator locked so will not work with any other operator service than Sonera.

The agreement is 24-month long and with an iPhone 16Gb the basic level (called Small) it costs 31.69 Euro a month plus 245 Euro for the device. Over the entire duration of the deal the total cost will be 1005.56 Euro. The customer isforced to use Sonera cellular service as long as she wants to use the iPhone that came with it.

The basic package is pretty lame. It includes 100 minutes of voice calls, 100 SMSs and a ridiculously low 100 MB of data transfer. Maybe that is OK for browsing but once one starts streaming video or downloading podcasts, the data cap will be easily reached. The extra charge for the data over the limit will be 1.49 Euro/MB. Sonera offers free access to their WiFi service in Finland but with a 3G device supporting high speed downloads, one just wants to feel free to use it anyplace and anytime.
There is an option to go for the more expensive packages. The package "Large" includes 1GB a month of data transfer but comes at a 89.99 euro a month + 85 Euro for the iPhone. Total over 24 month period: 2244.76 euro!

When considering that operators in Finland are already offering unlimited data plans starting at 9.99Euro, I wonder why Sonera did not offer that at least on the more expensive packages. Asking customers to make a 24-month commitment on these conditions just to get an operator locked device seems quite unreasonable to me.

Operator locked means also that all people who are not Sonera customers will be left out of the possibility of using an iPhone in Finland. I guess non-sonera customers account for at least 50% of the Finnish population of cellphone users, and that is quite a big group.

Exclusivity agreements are not good for consumers. Like in this case, they often end-up with customers paying more or being left out from the possibility of getting something they would want.