Wireless trailblazer Peter Adderton originally planned to launch the U.S. operations of Boost Mobile U.S. in Santa Monica, but the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks a quarter-century ago redirected his path south to Orange County.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were stuck. We couldn\u2019t leave,\u201d Adderton said of the chaos after terrorists struck New York City, the Pentagon and a site in Pennsylvania. \u201cThe airplanes were down for two or three weeks. Everything was grounded.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fortunately, he knew fellow Australians in OC.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey all said, \u2018you should come down to Orange County. It was a September afternoon. It was 85 degrees. I was on Balboa Island. I\u2019m like, \u2018this is insane, this is like Australia.\u2019\u201d
Once he got here, though, there was no doubt about the future.<\/p>\n
\u201cI said this is it. We\u2019re going to set up in Orange County,\u201d Adderton told the Business Journal in an interview on Oct. 12. \u201cThere are two places in the world that I would ever live in \u2014 Orange County is one and Sydney is the other.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adderton founded Boost Mobile in Australia in 2000 and brought the brand to Irvine a year later. He exited his operational role after Nextel Communications acquired the company in 2003. Twenty years later, he launched Irvine-based MobileX, which uses AI to help consumers lower their cellphone bills.<\/p>\n
Earlier this month, the Business Journal honored him as an Innovator of the Year at a ceremony held at the Irvine Marriott for his work in challenging the stigma surrounding prepaid cellphone plans.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a whole segment of customers out there that could be interested in pre-paid, where you don\u2019t need credit and you get can get a device. I wanted to make it cool,\u201d he said, adding that he didn\u2019t want his customers to feel like \u201cthe cheaper class in society.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said the award meant a great deal.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m proud of what our team has built and grateful to our retail and dealer partners, and especially our customers, who have embraced a different approach to wireless,\u201d he said, noting that he\u2019s been in Orange County for 25 years.<\/p>\n
Boost Beginnings<\/p>\n
Adderton has consistently championed pre-paid wireless plans, which save consumers money, as opposed to unlimited plans.<\/p>\n
When launching Boost Mobile \u2014 a brand that targeted younger customers with prepaid service and distinctive marketing \u2014 he said he realized that mobile was becoming increasingly important, but at the time there was \u201cno brand that really attracts the pre-pay market.\u201d<\/p>\n
He noted that the big, publicly listed carriers offered unlimited plans and \u201cbasically had a fishnet and they dragged it along and picked up everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ironically, Boost eventually became part of one of those wireless giants when Sprint acquired Nextel in 2005. By 2010, Boost had become a nationally recognized brand, airing a Super Bowl commercial featuring members of the 1985 Chicago Bears championship team.<\/p>\n
Launching MobileX<\/p>\n
Eventually, Adderton started pre-paid wireless company MobileX in 2023, a company that uses artificial intelligence to predict how much data customers need, delivering a dramatic reduction in cost while ensuring reliable speed and service.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody should pay for wireless they don\u2019t use,\u201d Adderton said the day after winning his Business Journal award. \u201cMobileX was built to fix that, using AI to give customers a plan that actually fits what they need.\u201d<\/p>\n
MobileX says it offers fully customizable plans starting at $3.88 per month, with prices rising as mobile data usage increases.<\/p>\n
While it remains small compared with AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon, which together reportedly control more than 90% of the U.S. cellphone market, MobileX has established a national presence.<\/p>\n
Like Boost, MobileX has expanded its national reach, selling plans at 3,700 Walmart stores, through more than 5,000 independent wireless dealers and via Best Buy and Amazon. The company, which operates on the Verizon network, has approximately 107,000 paid subscribers, according to a filing with the Federal Communications Commission this past summer.<\/p>\n
The company is now slated to be acquired by telecom tycoon Charlie Ergen.<\/p>\n
Adderton, who also founded Mandalay Digital, now Digital Turbine, and Amp\u2019d Mobile, remains mystified that so many mobile customers waste money by paying for services they do not use.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey seem to have a zombie-like mentality when it comes to mobile,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Telecom Tycoon Ergen Moves to Take Control of MobileX<\/p>\n
Pre-paid wireless company MobileX is scheduled to come under the control of telecom tycoon Charlie Ergen\u2019s CONX Corp. soon.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re still waiting for FCC approval. We expect to have that hopefully in the next two weeks,\u201d Peter Adderton, MobileX founder, told the Business Journal on Oct. 12. He will stay as MobileX CEO.<\/p>\n
Under the agreement, CONX will acquire 61% of MobileX, with Adderton holding about 19%. Verizon will be a minority stakeholder in MobileX.<\/p>\n
The investment will help Mobile X expand its AI-powered technology platform.<\/p>\n
Ergen will provide MobileX a \u201cstrategic investment.\u201d While financial details have not been disclosed, the Wall Street Journal estimated the deal values MobileX at about $200 million.<\/p>\n
Adderton said CONX is ready to spend money to make MobileX better known to a wider swath of potential customers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you look at MobileX, it just needs brand awareness,\u201d Adderton said, citing the need for heavy investment to make MobileX more widely known.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wireless trailblazer Peter Adderton originally planned to launch the U.S. operations of Boost Mobile U.S. in Santa Monica,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502012,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[163,165,164],"class_list":["post-502011","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502011","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=502011"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502011\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502012"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}