Q: What is the Cell Buddy ID-SIM card?

The Cell Buddy ID-SIM is intended to be the first SIM that can authenticate a user, on many entities, in addition to its original mobile provider.

The traditional SIM cards that we all have in our mobile phones are typically given or sold to us by our mobile operator, but only work effectively within your home country. With the Cell Buddy ID-SIM, you can receive the same smooth access available with your regular provider, but all around the world.

There's no need to worry about the high cost of roaming charges with the Cell Buddy ID-SIM. Rather than bouncing you back and forth to your home provider, draining your battery and increasing your phone bill, our ID-SIM will automatically authenticate you with a local mobile provider.

Whether you're at home or abroad, with the Cell Buddy ID-SIM you can enjoy low, predictable rates and high-quality for Internet and voice.

To make you feel more like yourself, wherever you are, our SIM maintains your caller information, so when you receive or generate phone calls or SMS, you will always be available with your original phone number.
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Q: Why use your roaming solution?

Traveling provides enough headaches without adding the high cost of cell phone charges. To make things worse, you have to combat with slow internet speed due to roaming as your phone attempts to connect with its home provider. Rather than go through all that trouble, we have created the first SIM that gives a user hassle-free authentication. With the Cell Buddy ID-SIM, you receive automatic authentication on not only your original mobile provider, but on additional entities as well all at a manageable, flat rate fee.

Break free from the bouncing back-and-forth and enjoy the convenient accessibility of local internet access. 
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Q: Who is your target market?

Currently, the roaming market consists of about 800 million travelers a year, all of whom are paying high charges just for using their mobile phones.

According to a recent survey by Juniper research, in 2012, these 800 million travelers have paid 46 Billion USD and with the cost increasing, will pay 80 billion USD in 2017 when abroad. The majority of the payments have been allocated for Internet access and voice calls.
However, we estimate that these charges are much higher, approximately 40 times higher than we pay in our own country.

As a first stage in accessing this market, Cell Buddy intends to approach medium sized corporations, where the need is great and the willing to save is the highest.
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Q: Which territories are you going to target first?

To maximize our efforts the Cell Buddy SIM will be available in the European, North American and Chinese markets as these territories are highly trafficked locations for business minded individuals.
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Q: Which phones will work with Cell Buddy’s ID-SIM solution?

The beauty of the Cell Buddy ID-SIM is its innovative design to be fully compatible with the standard ISO 7816. To date our ID-SIM was tested and found compatible with most of the leading Android phones and with over 40 mobile providers worldwide. Apple and Blackberry phones will follow soon.

However due to phone and operator interoperability issues, the company will release pre-approved list of operators and handsets that were tested and found most compatible with our ID-SIM card.
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Q: What type of work do users need to do in order to implement Cell Buddy’s roaming solution?

Implementation of the Cell Buddy roaming solution is accomplished in two easy steps:
1)  Replace the own original SIM card with a Cell Buddy ID-SIM. If you want to keep backward compatibility, simply place the original SIM card in a special socket provided by Cell Buddy. This special socket is located between the battery and the battery cover and is connected with a tiny wire to the Cell Buddy ID-SIM.

2)  Once you have landed at your international destination, simply turn on both the phone and a small, standard portable hotspot. The portable hotspot is only needed for a few seconds following the power up of the user’s phone and only for the very brief network authentication period.
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Q: How do you intend to charge your users?

Cell Buddy knows the importance of providing open and clear communication of costs and works hard to provide an advanced estimate of the total so our users can remain connected to those back home.

For our roaming solution, Cell buddy intends to simplify the payment process at the benefit of our users and charge a daily, flat rate fee. We estimate this fixed fee to be about $15 per day and only for the days the user is abroad.
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Q: When I travel abroad, my internet quality is very low and my battery runs out fast. Why?

Your internet speed, while roaming, is very slow due to congested internet traffic that must travel back to your home operator through a special backbone. The mobile operators roaming backbone has limited bandwidth and therefore we all suffer from slow roaming internet. With Cell Buddy your internet access is the fastest possible.

Unfortunately, while we are abroad our phones are constantly searching and working hard to hook back to the home network. It is through this constant searching for a home network that you may experience a slight decrease in battery life.
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Q: How are you different than Skype/Viber or other solutions I can download to my mobile phone?

Cell Buddy’s roaming solution automatically assigns a local SIM card whenever you land in a new country and turn on the phone. This means that wherever you are, it's easy to jump online or begin make voice calls as if you are in your home country.

Since the connection is GSM based, you will enjoy a high quality experience of surfing the internet or making phone calls.

Due to the typically free and shared Wi-Fi connections available, you are more likely to receive poor quality service thus making the Cell Buddy ID-SIM a more viable option Skype or similar solutions.
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Q: Can I buy your product online and not through a distributor?

Once launched and on the market, the Cell Buddy ID-SIM will be available for purchase within our online store. For quick access, simply follow the link via our home page where it will be available for mail deliver. Additionally, the app, when available, can be downloaded from the Google Play or Apple app store.
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Q: Does your ID-SIM work only in mobile phones or also in other devices?

The Cell Buddy ID-SIM was thoroughly tested and was found compatible with a variety of portable hotspot solutions, such as MiFi.
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Q: Does your SIM work on a carrier locked phone?

To enjoy the ease and quality of the Cell Buddy SIM, it is required that a phone be unlocked. However, we are currently working on providing solutions for the roaming solution to be available on a locked phone.
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Q: Do you encounter any issues obtaining SIM cards or cooperation with operators?

On the contrary, we have developed great relationships with operators who are exciting at the opportunity to work with an innovative solution such as the Cell Buddy ID-SIM. We provide a benefit to the operators of directing more incoming traffic their way that may otherwise go to their competition. It is with this relationship that they are eager to provide our users with the best quality.

Q: Do you plan more applications for your SIM card?

Yes! The possibilities are endless. From parental control to banking apps, to TV replacement apps, we are looking to design a platform with incredible scalability and extensibility. Stay tuned, the innovation has just begun.
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Q: Will your ID-SIM for roaming solution drain my battery faster?

When you use your mobile phone or personal hotspot abroad, your device is roaming.
This means that your device will continuously search for the home operator to save money. An unfortunate drawback to this constant search is your phone's battery gets drained faster than normal.

Cell Buddy’s ID-SIM, however, bypasses the issue of searching and quickly authenticates your device with a local SIM identity. That means no searching and major savings on both your wallet and battery.
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Q: When I roam, how does Cell Buddy handle incoming calls that were intended to my original number?

Upon exiting your home country, Cell Buddy sends a "follow me" instruction to your mobile provider. This way while you are abroad, all phone calls will be automatically routed to a local access number. When you have reached your destination, our ID-SIM sends your location information to our server. From there, your incoming calls with be routed to a local number that your phone obtained once turned authenticated. In all reality, it means you will pay very low cost fee - the cost of a local call in your home country when someone calls you from abroad.
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Q: Can people call me on my local number so it won’t cost them international prices?

When you turn on your phone in foreign country, the system will provide you with your local number that will be valid along with your home number. This way you can be easily reached locally and internationally.
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Q: Do I have to inform Cell Buddy when I land in a new country?

The beauty of Cell Buddy is that our service is fully automatic. Our ID-SIM senses the country that you are visiting and sends this information to our server. This means the server can assign you a local SIM and then route all the incoming calls to your original number to the number that was just assigned to you.
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Q: How can I use Cell Buddy’s ID-SIM to eliminate phishing and hacking?

When you try to log in into a certain website, say your favorite online email service, there will be a pop up message on your phone that will confirm your identity before allowing access.
Once confirmed, your ID-SIM will verify that it is a legitimate website, to eliminate phishing and will verify your identity so that you will not be required to type in your password. On top of that, we provide a layer of added security where your password is not transmitted over the air or exposed to the software on the phone so hacking your password will be virtually impossible.
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