Helio on Tuesday began a U.S. cellular phone service aimed at young people who use cellphones for web surfing, hoping to break into the U.S. market by targeting niche segments, reports Reuters. Chief Executive Sky Dayton says its pricey plans are for people who are more focused on getting the latest data services than the cheapest voice calls.
Dayton says Helio's exclusive agreement to offer a cellphone version of MySpace, which has around 70 million customers, as one of its key draws.
"This isn't for the average American subscriber. If you're not going to use a lot of data you're not going to buy this service," Jupiter Research analyst Julie Ask said. "It will be attractive to heavy consumers of data services such as messaging, mobile video, news and things like MySpace."