2.5G or 3G? Can't decide? Have both, says Vodafone

Vodafone has today announced the launch of its first flirtation with European 3G. The mobile operator has gone for the cash cow of the moment, data services, with the debut of its Vodafone Mobile Connect 3G/GPRS data card.

The card has data rates of up to 384kbps and allows laptop users to access their mobile office - email, web, calendar and the like - as much as ten times faster than the GPRS equivalent. UK users will be able to get their hands on the data card in the next four weeks, as will those in other European countries, including Germany, Italy, Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands and Sweden.

While the rollout of 3G networks is gathering momentum, in the event of a mobile worker finding themselves out of 3G coverage, the card will swap to GPRS. The Mobile Connect card will initially be offered to Vodafone's corporate customers, with a rollout for smaller businesses planned later.

The card has been in the works for several months, with the operator's CEO, Arun Sarin, talking about Vodafone's new baby at ITU Telecom World last year. Speaking at the event, Sarin said that consumers weren't interested in the "alphabet soup" of flavours of wireless but were more concerned about being online, whatever the method. Most "customers don't care - they just want connectivity," he said.

'Continuous connectivity' may tempt Vodafone's customers but, until recently, crossing the Atlantic brought problems for data-services users. While Vodafone's data cards had worked using GSM networks, US carrier Verizon used CDMA, leaving users in a hole. A new data card was launched in August last year that could work with both network technologies.