Issa Asad CEO of Q Link: unlimited calls and 1 GB of data for $10
Issa Asad Florida
If you have a cell phone in the United States, then the chances are that you are a customer of one of the Big Four: AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile or Verizon. The huge telecommunication conglomerates dominate the cell phone and wireless data markets with almost 95% of the market. With this large a share, are they really incentivized to give their customers excellent service at low prices?
Many growing businesses seem believe the top 4 carriers cannot, and as such have been able to nudge their way into the telecommunications market by offering low rates for calls and data to customers on a prepaid pay-as-you-go service. The Sun Sentinel, a newspaper that brings breaking news across South Florida, recently featured Q Link, a fast-growing prepaid phone service based out of Dania Beach, Florida.
The article, “$10 for unlimited calls and 1 GB of data? Rock-bottom phone rates are growing”, details some of Q Link’s plan specifics. It also explains how Issa Asad, the founder and CEO of Q Link is the leader of prepaid phone service in South Florida.
In the article, Asad identified that there was a gap in the market with customers who did not want to tie themselves up with long term contracts but instead wanted to be able to choose packages that suited their own needs. Q Link does not tie their customers up in confining contracts or offer them never-ending finance plans on expensive phones. Instead, they offer quality cell phone and data services at rock bottom prices.
Customers can pay as little as $10 a month for unlimited calls and 1 GB of data. This is a far cry from the spiraling bills you get if you are a customer of one of the Big Four, and one wonders how Q Link is able to offer such low prices.
The secret appears to be their business model, where they buy excess capacity on Sprint’s network at a low cost and then repackage and sell it to their customers. This suggests that the Big Four could do the same and offer cheaper packages to their customers who might be interested in more streamlined packages. This does not seem to be something that they are interested in, however, possibly because they are afraid that offering this type of package to their customers might cause an exodus from their lucrative high-end packages. Instead, they prefer to rely on their wall-to-wall marketing and the ignorance of their customers regarding possible alternatives.
That leaves businessmen like Asad to step in and offer those customers what they really want: excellent service at a low cost. In particular, Asad focused on lower-income households who are not able to afford the high prices of the Big Four and are entitled to free cell phone access through the Lifeline program. This has helped Q Link to build a customer base of two and a half million customers.
The challenge that innovative businessmen like Asad face is that the Big Four hold all the aces, as companies like Q Link are still dependent on them to provide the network capacity. Should Q Link try to challenge the Big Four, they could quickly see their access to excess capacity withdrawn or suddenly jumping in price, making their business unsustainable. These resellers survive at the forbearance of the Big 4 and as such try to fly under the radar as much as possible.
It if it is not already clear, the chances are that you aren’t getting the best deal from the Big Four. So, if you want to pay $10 a month for unlimited calls and 1 GB of data, then you need to escape the grip of the Big Four.
To read the full article by the Sun Sentinel click here: https://www.sun-sentinel.com/business/jobs/fl-bz-q-link-wireless-races-to-phone-price-bottom-20190328-story.html.
