Vodafone Expo

Well - just been to the Vodafone mobile 'expedition' expo! Apart from being a lot of fun (wearing a pith helmut & negotiating a simulated jungle!), I made some good contacts re wireless connectivity.

1. Renaissance (via Craig Bouvaird) sell the Telecom data card, and have written Mac drivers for it! They also resale a 3G to WiFi router. Looking forward to borrowing it & having a play creating mobile workgroups for laptops & Palms!!!

2. Discovered the resller of the Linksys 3G to WiFi router (WRT54G3G) = Ingram Micro, Matt Hoskin, matt.hoskin@ingrammicro.co.nz
Matt mentioned the WRT54G3G will resale for $600NZ including the Vodafone 3G card early next year. He also mentioned Vodafone data cards will go from 384kbps to 1.4Mbps next year - YAY!!!

3. Came across a company (dang - didn't get a card!) that supplies text services for enrolments/advertising etc. Currently used by UCOL & Wintec - lots of possibilities there!

4. Finally, stumbled across the mGovernment initiative (a spin off from the eGovernment initiative) - for qualifying institutions to bulk purchase Vodafone connections! - $30 access fee per month per mobile, zero cent for mobile-to-mobile within your organization. I discussed the idea of a student DATA rate, which I will follow up at a later stage! shane.grove@vodafone.com
mGovt@vodafone.com

All in all - a worthwhile outing!