When Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump announced Trump Mobile earlier this week, they joined the ever-growing list of celebrities with mobile phone networks.
Over the past few years, an increasing number of these smaller, public figure-fronted networks have been cropping up. SmartLess Mobile, owned by actors and podcast hosts Will Arnett, Sean Hayes, and Jason Bateman, is a recent example, while Mint Mobile, which was partly owned by actor Ryan Reynolds before it was sold to T-Mobile TMUS in 2024, is a more well-known example. A host of others have launched and folded over the years.
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So what’s with the sudden rise in celebrity mobile networks? Is cashing in on the telecom boom the next big thing?
When celebrities like the Trumps launch a mobile service they are not building their own networks, CNN explains. Instead, they’re leasing spectrum from the major carriers. This kind of partnership helps to cut down on start up costs and hassle for celebrity founders and provides an additional source of revenue for the major network providers.
These mobile virtual network operators, or MVNOs, are not new. Nor are they all small start ups. Richard Branson‘s Virign Mobile, which launched in 1999, is technically a MVNO. However, the increase in their popularity is new, and is tied to a few different factors.
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A decrease in loyalty to major providers, improved technologies that enables even smaller companies to have better customer service and technical support, and the prevalence of SIM cards that make these switches easier, are the primary drivers behind the growth of MVNOs, CNN reports.
“The technology made it a little easier to switch. And at the same time, consumers became a lot more loyal to the phone manufacturer,” Consumer Intelligence Research Partners analyst Michael Levin told CNN. “And then the carrier was kind of less important.”
Another major perk of these celebrity mobile networks is their affordability. CNN says that MVNO plans aren’t always cheaper than larger providers’, but the smaller companies tend to offer more enticing promotions.
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“You get this very exciting offer, for example: three months at $15 a month. But thereafter then you go back to $45,” Octavio Garcia, a senior research analyst at market research firm Forrester, told CNN. “But when you are done with three months, there is a new offer that brings you down to $30, not $45.”
MVNO networks are also very common outside of the U.S. Walmart Mexico’s Bait MVNO network had 19.8 million users at the end of Q1 2025, the company said. In Italy, a MVNO network branded by the AC Milan soccer team is an oft-used service.
Success stories like these are likely inspiring American copycats. “To see that it’s easier to set up MVNO as a smaller company, I think it’s a sign of a telecom industry that’s moving in a certain direction,” Canalys analyst Runar Bjørhovde told CNN.
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