Vodafone Italia has altered the conditions of its Vodafone Special 100 Digital Edition offer and is now making it available to customers of more rival operators. The plan comes with 100 GB of data plus unlimited calls and SMS for €9.99 (US $12.04) a month. It is now available to anyone porting a number from Iliad and Fastweb Mobile, as well as from MVNOs including CoopVoce and Tiscali.

Activation fees are charged at 1 eurocent (US $0.01), and the plan also comes with free membership to the operator’s Happy Black loyalty program, which normally costs €1.99 (US $2.40) a month and includes dozens of discounts and special rewards plus unlimited access to map applications.

Tarifica’s Take

Vodafone Italia is continuing an aggressive move to part customers from rival operators, both MNOs and MVNOs, extending it to include more of its rivals. It is undoubtedly bold to offer 100 GB—a very generous amount of data—along with unlimited voice minutes, at an extremely low monthly price. As a major operator in the Italian market, Vodafone can certainly afford to essentially give away its product, at least on a short-term basis, as a way to attract subscribers.

Ultimately, Vodafone will likely upsell these new customers once they become acclimated to their new operator and a degree of brand loyalty has been established. The operator is aiming to lure a wide range of new customers, some of whom were previously subscribers to budget-oriented MVNOs and some of whom were not. Some of these new customers will likely be lower-end users, while some will not. Therefore, it is to be expected that these subscribers will eventually have to be moved to various different plan types and levels, not just one, even if they all do sign on initially for just one, the Vodafone Special 100 Digital Edition. Perhaps some of the lower-end users will even become higher-end users if they become accustomed to using the increased amount of data provided by Vodafone’s competitive offer.