The 11 most innovative telecom companies

The Benchmark Series

This post is part of the Benchmark Series, listing the most innovative challenger companies in different traditional markets. These benchmarks are part of the Tuesday in the Design Sprints we do for our enterprise clients.

Innovative telecom companies are changing how we connect to the world around us. Wired and wireless carriers confront a rapidly shifting technology landscape in which small steps toward digitization are no longer enough. For this Benchmark series edition, we picked the most innovative telecom companies from all over the world who are dedicated to transform the industry.

Anywhere Sim, UK

Anywhere Sim is a brand new virtual mobile network. Their aim is to provide a truly mobile sim which works almost anywhere. Their agreements with multiple networks enable them to provide a seamless multi network experience in the UK, which until now was only possible for overseas visitors! Their service is available on pay as you go, but they also have a a range of options for everyone else.

FreedomPop, USA

FreedomPop is a global telecommunications company delivering free wireless internet and free mobile phone service around the world. FreedomPop was founded in 2011 with a stated goal to eliminate the digital divide and provide free wireless broadband internet access to everyone, everywhere.

Freewheel, USA

Freewheel is powered by the millions of WiFi hotspots that extend from your home to the coffee shop to your office to your school. This means that wherever you are — across town or across the globe — you can talk, text, download, upload, and stream wherever there’s WiFi, without ever paying a penny more.

giffgaff, UK

At the heart of it, giffgaff believes in something simple: ‘a better way to do mobile’. A belief that gets them up in the morning ready to challenge the old way of doing things. They are the David amongst Goliaths in mobile-land. They are a new way of doing things and their ambition is endless. Hence the name ‘giffgaff’, which is Scottish for mutual giving. That pretty much sums them up.

Kymeta, USA

Kymeta delivers on what connectivity is meant to be — secure, available, universal and global. Kymeta is removing barriers by providing an innovative means of leveraging satellite network capacity for high bandwidth communication access while on the move. The company’s first product, a software-enabled metamaterials-based electronic beamforming antenna for satellite communications, will keep boats, planes, cars and more connected.

LiveU, USA

LiveU sets the standard for high-quality and reliable live video acquisition, management and distribution over IP. LiveU’s award-winning technology enables live video transmission from any location around the world.

Open Garden, USA

Their revolutionary peer-to-peer mesh networking technology enables communities, organizations and app developers to create resilient, people-powered networks and services, extending the reach of the Internet.

Project Fi, USA

Project Fi is a wireless service from Google. They intelligently shift between multiple networks. Project Fi automatically connects you to the best available signal, whether that’s Wi-Fi or one of their three 4G LTE partner networks.

Ting, USA

For too long, the companies that offer the access people need have held all the power in the relationship. Ting is built on fairness and clarity instead of opacity and obfuscation. They’re changing the industry because they are tired of business as usual too.

Twilio, USA

Twilio takes care of the messy telecom hardware and exposes a globally available cloud API that developers can interact with to build intelligent and complex communications systems. As your app’s usage scales up or down, Twilio automatically scales with you. You only pay for what you use — no contracts, no shenanigans.

Ukkoverkot, Finland

Ukkoverkot Inc is a Finnish wireless data operator, that sells, markets and maintains a mobile data network that covers all of Finland and is the fastest local wireless Internet connection. The company focuses purely on the production of wireless datacommunication services, especially for demanding customers such as companies, authorities and rural areas as well as for industrial Internet purposes.

Go Weekly is a lightweight strategic partner for your innovation. We translate trends and ideas into a digital prototype in one week. Working together with companies to make a leap forward in their industry with new products that can match or exceed the benchmarks in this series. Looking to think ahead with us? Get in touch.