Freedom Mobile to sell iPhone X for $0 upfront

Shaw Communications Inc.’s Freedom Mobile will shake up the way wireless carriers have traditionally sold Apple Inc. devices in Canada when it starts selling iPhones for the first time on Friday.

Freedom Mobile will sell the latest slate of iPhones, including the 8, 8 Plus and X, for $0 upfront on two-year contracts, Shaw announced in a news release Wednesday.

This pricing strategy is a sharp departure from the standard followed by the Big Three carriers Rogers Communications Inc., BCE Inc. and Telus Corp., none of which offer the newest, most expensive iPhones for zero down just months after a release.

As of Tuesday, the Big Three were selling the flagship iPhone X starting at $599 upfront plus $95 per month on two-year plans. That price only includes 1 GB of data, according to the carriers’ websites. The iPhone 8 and 8+ start at $229 and $359 on the same rate plans.

Freedom’s iPhone plans, on the other hand, include 10 GB of data starting at $65 per month for the iPhone 8 up to $110 per month for the iPhone X. To get that much data and a new iPhone from the Big Three, customers must pay at least $155 per month plus the upfront cost.

The steep discount comes with the caveat that Freedom’s network only covers major centres in B.C., Alberta and Ontario, meaning consumers may face additional roaming charges outside those zones.

Still, it’s a major deal for datahungry customers in Canada’s largest cities, especially considering wireless players earned more than $1 billion last year from data overage charges alone, according to the CRTC. The move falls in line with Shaw’s ambitions to lure customers away from its incumbent competitors.

Industry watchers expect the ability to sell iPhones — regardless of the big data plans — will help Freedom. It has been at a competitive disadvantage for years since previous generations of the extremely popular iPhone could not work on its network, which was slower and less reliable than those of its Big Three competitors.

But Shaw has spent millions upgrading to an LTE-advanced network, and in October announced it had reached a deal with Apple to sell iPhones. Shaw expects to finish network upgrades in Western Canada by early December and in the rest of its footprint by early 2018.

“Canadians have told us they want access to Apple’s range of products on a vastly improving network at a reasonable price,” Shaw president Jay Mehr said in a statement.

“By offering iPhone in combination with our Big Gig data plans and significant network improvements, we’re giving Canadians a new and improved option in a wireless service provider.”