If you have seen ads for ice.net without knowing what it is, you are not alone. I thought myself, maybe just another MVNO company. No, this time it is the rebranded new CDMA mobile operator company which used to go under the brand Nordisk Mobiltelefon.
Ice.net is using what was once known as NMT, the best mobile network in Europe that started already in the late 70s and had from the beginning full support for roaming and handover throughout the Nordic region countries. NMT operated in the 450 Mhz frequency band when introduced and got because of lack of capacity introduced in the 900 Mhz band, better suited for small city cell sites providing better capacity. NMT got superceded by the introduction of digital mobile services based on the GSM standard in the 900 Mhz and later in the 1800 Mhz (850 and 1900 Mhz in North America). The analog NMT 450 system lived on for awhile until abandoned and spectrum relicensed. The new NMT.net now Nordisk Mobiltelefon with subsidiaries throughout the Nordic countries got into using this spectrum with the Qualcomm developed CDMA2000 standard.
So, as a result now you have a Swedish startup operator providing 3G CDMA 2000 based services in the 450 Mhz frequency band with the advantages of excellent coverage in rural areas where you in many cases cannot get the UTMS 3G services and also in a number of places NO fixed line internet broadband access. Ice.net also as a result provides fixed wireless services for internet broadband access.
See snapshot of coverage from company homepage.
