Why would anyone buy a Ferrari and then consistently drive it at just 50 kilometres per hour?
By anyone’s standards, that would surely seem to be defeating the purpose of this beautiful machine, which, after all, was built for speed.
And while we’re not advocating any law-breaking behaviour here at Vox, we do believe in using things in the manner and purpose for which they were created.
For example, we are fans of the following (most South Africans would probably agree):
Pouring a brandy and coke instead of brandy and tea: check.
Using golf drivers on the teeing ground instead of the green: check.
Grilling meat on the braai instead of tofu: check.
Going for a hike in proper hiking boots instead of expensive Italian shoes: check.
Using 5G networks to offer the highest speed and lowest latency possible: check, check, check!
That last example is particularly important to us – Vox is in the business of keeping people connected, after all.
So you can imagine our surprise when we discovered that a particular operator is using its 5G network to essentially offer a 4G product speeds. (To us, that’s like buying the Ferrari for your grandmother.)
5G Opens Up Worlds of Possibilities
Unprecedented speed is just the beginning of how 5G is changing the face of connectivity. Emerging 5G networks feature lower latency, higher capacity, and increased bandwidth compared to 4G. These network improvements will have far-reaching impacts on how people live, work and play all over the world.
In short, higher performance and improved efficiencies will empower new user experiences and connect new industries.
Vox is proud to offer our own Fixed Data 5G offerings – you can check out our offerings here.
5G’s lower latency enables better live streaming, improved gaming capabilities and experiences, and improved video calling. In addition, greater bandwidth provides faster and smoother download and upload speeds that are potentially more than 10 times faster than current 4G capabilities!
Uncapped (with transparent 1,000GB and 2,000GB FUPs – see the next section for a quick explanation of this) means lots of video watching, file downloading, gaming, video calling and more.
Clarifying Fair Usage Policy (FUP)
Fair Usage Policy, or FUP, limits the use of the internet, and the speed at which the consumer is able to experience the internet, after they’ve reached the consumption of a certain volume of data.
The purpose of a FUP policy is to ensure equitable bandwidth distribution among all users – it’s put in place to prevent the over-use or abuse of services by a few users, which could then lead to the unavailability of these services for other users. And so, once a user surpasses the clarified threshold (as agreed in the Terms and Conditions), their internet speed is decreased in a specified manner to maintain service quality for everyone.
Vox clarifies our FUP policies very clearly in our terms and conditions.
Staying with cars imagery, you could say that a FUP policy is similar to ensuring that nobody gets to hog the fast lane on the highway in a so-called Blue Light Brigade convoy all the time, thus forcing everyone else’s journeys to be temporarily slowed down or disrupted. You could think of FUP as enforcing a more democratic usage of the internet highways and by-ways.
Raining on the Consumers’ 5G Parade?
Earlier in the article we mentioned that – in our opinion – a telecommunications provider is essentially using 5G equipment to offer a 4G experience. Let’s unpack that.
The provider’s advertised standard package starts at R795 for uncapped 5G at 30Mbps. Upgrading to 60Mbps will cost the consumer an additional R200 per month, while upgrading to 100Mbps upgrade is an extra R400.
In contrast, Vox’s 5G offering is not speed limited.
(But wait, there’s more.)
In addition, while this particular operator says that there is no FUP applied on these offers, we have noted in its Terms and Conditions that it reserves the right to manage the speeds and data allocations to protect its network and ensure a good experience for all users. In our opinion, this is an easy way out of not committing to FUPs.
Simply put, the whole purpose of a 5G network is to offer the fastest internet speeds and lowest latencies. We believe that setting speed limits on a 5G offering is misleading at best, particularly to consumers who are still coming to terms with the meaning of 5G and its capabilities.
It should also be noted that the lower priced bundles offered by this provider are done with smaller FUP values (data bundles before being throttled), which, in other words, represents less value and which is insufficient for 5G speeds. The end result is that customers run out of data more quickly and then have to buy expensive top-ups. Again, this does not represent a true 5G experience but is more representative of a 4G experience.
Moving Ahead
5G presents the unfolding of new experiences and capabilities, both at the level of the consumer as well as industries.
At Vox, we encourage users to do their research before purchasing, to make sure they’re buying the real thing. Finding out that an operator is providing speed profiles on its 5G networks – where in fact 5G has the capability of reaching between 200Mbps and 1Gbps – is, in our opinion, highly questionable.
From our perspective, Vox is proud to present our 5G offering and we believe that it is a pure and premium product using top-tier technology for its true, high-speed purpose – at fair pricing.
Our 5G solutions – like Ferraris – are designed for speed, and anything else is just wrong.
Vroom.
Click here for bonus fast car audio-visuals.
Click here for Vox 5G.
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