Adderton Leaves Amp’d Mobile
6/13/07 – Telephony’s Wireless Review reports that a spokeswoman has confirmed that Amp’d Mobile founder and CEO Peter Adderton has left the company. This follows on the heels of Amp’d’s chapter 11 filing last week.
According to the report, no interim CEO has been selected yet and the company’s senior management will continue to run the company for the time being. It also said that Adderton would remain on the company’s board while it navigates chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Amp’d’s chapter 11 filing has left in its wake numerous questions about the viability of the mobile virtual network operator, or MVNO, business model—where a company uses the wireless services of a mobile operator like Verizon Wireless and builds a specialized service on top of the basic service. In Amp’d’s case, it was content geared to the youth market. There has been some speculation that Amp’d could ultimately emerge scaled down as a mobile content provider.
Amp’d and Westwood-based Helio, a joint venture of Internet service provider EarthLink and South Korea’s SK Telecom, are perhaps the most well-known MVNOs. Helio has taken a somewhat different approach than Amp’d by building and customizing its own devices. It has received a boost lately through the considerable buzz generated by the company’s Ocean dual-slider phone and data device.
Amp’d Mobile – www.ampdmobile.com
Helio – www.helio.com
