Wednesday, November 2, 2011

United Online Inks Mobile Broadband Deal

Woodland Hills-based United Online has inked a deal to offer up mobile, broadband Internet access, via a deal today with Clearwire. According to the two companies, they are in a new, five-year wholesale agreement which will make 4G high speed broadband service available under United Online's NetZero brand name. Financial details of the deal were not announced. The two said that consumers will be able to access the broadband service by either buying a NetZero USB modem, or purchasing a NetZero personal hotspot device. Pricing on the new broadband service from NetZero was not announced. The move is the first for United Online into the wireless/broadband access area; the company has mostly been milking the last remaining, dialup customers it has to fund other businesses, including its purchase of floral delivery service FTD and Classmates.com (now Memory Lane). Clearwire is a provider of broadband wireless access, and is majority owned by Sprint.

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