TELUS and Dell Canada have announced an agreement to embed TELUS mobile broadband capabilities on select Dell notebooks and mobile workstations, including its Latitude models D420, D620 and D820, XPS M1210 and the Dell Precision M6.
Exclusive to TELUS clients across Canada, the mobile broadband option will enable the units to access the Internet with broadband-like download speeds using the TELUS Wireless High Speed (EVDO) service.
TELUS’ EVDO-based Wireless High Speed service is available in 21 areas across the country, including all major urban centres. The embedded cards can also access TELUS’ 1X network covering areas with 94% of the Canadian population.
Dell offers its HyperConnect service in the US through Verizon, Sprint and Cingular and Dell provides a comparison of the three.
For global roaming, the Cingular version leverages GSM/EDGE standards. TELUS offers US roaming which operates at 1X speeds.
Interesting that T-Mobile, with its network of WiFi hotspots and its mobile data network, does not have an agreement with Dell.
The agreement to embed a TELUS wireless card in Dell business-grade machines follows a TELUS promotion that provides a free Dell desktop computer to TELUS residential high speed internet subscribers when they subscribe to 3 year plans. Perhaps the relationship is a side benefit of Dell’s presence in the TELUS Plaza in Edmonton.
How will Rogers and Bell respond?