Telefonica Phone Cards Launched in the US

I recent saw that Blackstone, a leading prepaid distributor, is now selling phone cards here in the US from Telefonica who up until now have had little presence in the US market. There seems to be a trend lately with major telecom providers from other countries getting into the US market. Blackstone also sells cards from ETB, the major telecommunications provider from Colombia, and T-Mobile, owned by Dutch Telecom.

The trend is understandable as with the prepaid phone card market going bust a few years back left very few prepaid phone card providers to handle the demand. If a distributor wanted product, they had only a few choices for who to get them from (IDT, Ibasis, VCG, Radiant, At&T and a few other smaller providers).

The reality is that the prepaid phone card business is finally going main stream where only the big boys will be able to play. This is not a bad thing and will mean better quality and less games ultimately leading to a cleaner market.