Tired of high roaming cellular costs while travelling abroad? ExecMobile is a Johannesburg-based company that provides Sim cards and portable Wi-Fi units for 36 countries, meaning people who want data only while overseas needn’t pay exorbitant roaming fees to stay connected.

Its data offerings include a standalone 3G modem that can share its connection with up to five devices and offers customers various ways to get hold of a 3G modem, be it before they leave SA or when they arrive at their destination.

Customers can have a device delivered to them before they depart or will from February 2012 collect their device at the airport on their way out of the country. Customers can then arrange to have the device delivered to, or collected by, ExecMobile when they return.

In seven of the 36 countries in which the company has a presence, customers can even have the device delivered to their hotel or office and can simply put it in a self-addressed return envelope and drop it in the mail when they are returning home.

Alternatively, they can arrange for collection after returning to SA should they want to use the device right until take-off.

With the UK being one of the most common destinations for ExecMobile’s customers, it’s also possible to collect and return devices at all of London’s airports.

Regardless of the destination, ExecMobile charges in the region of R100/day for 150MB of data, though in some regions it’s possible to get a 1GB or 3G bundle rather than a daily allowance.

Although R100/day may sound like a lot of money, at around 66c/MB it’s considerably cheaper than data when roaming, which can cost between R17,50/MB on Vodacom’s Passport programme and as much as R128/MB.

ExecMobile founder Craig Lowe says that although some customers find it essential to maintain their own phone number when travelling, an increasing number are finding they can make do with a data connection while using voice-over-Internet Protocol services like Skype and Viber.

“Once you’ve got a data connection you can do just about everything,” says Lowe.

ExecMobile has two relationships that make its data offerings possible, one with T-Mobile in the US and Germany, and the other with Hutchinson, which has stakes in various networks, including a majority stake in Britain’s 3 network.

Lowe says ExecMobile will soon be offering its services for African destinations, too, starting with SA. “SA had about 550 000 outbound travellers last year and about 8m incoming. There’s definitely a market, especially for Europeans coming to SA.”

ExecMobile expects to begin offering services in Kenya, Tanzania, Nigeria, and Ghana in April.

The company has various products for those travelling to Europe, including one that provides connectivity in 16 European countries. “A customer can pick up a device in their first destination and drop it off in the last,” Lowe says.

With only four staff — but with plans to grow to 15 by the middle of next year — Lowe says ExecMobile is only possible because of cloud-based software-as-a-service offerings that allow it to manage aspects of the business like billing centrally.

Before Lowe founded ExecMobile he worked with Brian Armstrong at BT (Armstrong is now a senior executive at Telkom) and helped to set up the UK telecommunications company’s Middle East and African operations.

Lowe says there is only a small number of people for whom roaming makes sense, and cautions against the practice.

“The biggest bill I’ve ever heard of for roaming was R760 000 for two weeks in the US. There’s simply no reason for that to happen.” — Craig Wilson, TechCentral