Making Travel eSIMs Work the Moment You Land With Holafly

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[00:00:27] What happens when you land in a new country? Have you ever switched on your phone and discovered that the airport Wi-Fi has other plans that doesn't work? You don't know which one to connect to. That small moment can turn an exciting arrival into a hunt for directions, transport translation, a newspaper stand with a physical SIM card, all in a bid to just find a way to tell someone at home that you made it to your destination.

[00:00:57] Well, today I'm joined by the head of strategy at Holafly. And he's going to explain how travel eSIMs have moved from a technical curiosity to a very practical alternative to those massive roaming charges and physical SIM cards. So today I want to learn more about what travellers should compare beyond just price and why support matters most when something goes wrong.

[00:01:24] And also look at the complex network partnerships hidden behind the experience that is supposed to feel simple. So if eSIMs still sound intimidating to you, I'm going to try and help you make your next international arrival feel incredibly less stressful and much cheaper than one of those dreaded $100 roaming charges. But enough scene setting for me. Let me introduce you to my guest right now.

[00:01:52] So thank you for joining me on the show today. Can you tell everyone listening a little about who you are and what you do? Sure. So first of all, thanks, Neil, for having me. It's a pleasure to be here and a great opportunity to tell you a little bit more about Holafly. I'm Alfonso. I've always been passionate about entrepreneurship, startups, scale-ups, particularly about answering or understanding how companies grow on a scale. So I started my career back in trying to launch different entrepreneurial projects.

[00:02:21] Then I later moved to business strategy consulting. I spent several years there working with companies such as the Coca-Cola company, Procter & Gamble, the Lego Group, Buyer, Colgate, Decaplon, among others. I tried to help them with their growth on strategy challenges. And today I'm the head of strategy at Alfi. And I'm helping define the company's long-term direction and how we drive actually to our next stage of growth.

[00:02:49] And my role here, I'm covering corporate strategy, value proposition, innovation, go-to-market, international growth, pricing, revenue management. So again, that's a couple of different things. But here I'm trying to, again, going back to that question that I told you, which is how do great companies scale? And in this case, how Alfi is going to continue scaling at this piece?

[00:03:10] One of the things I try and do on this podcast every day is explore a different area of technology that maybe people have heard about, maybe they're unfamiliar with. And just try and demystify that space. And today, one of the reasons I was excited to get you on was to talk about the world of eSIMs. And eSIMs are something that have moved from a specialist travel product towards mainstream adoption now. When people land, they just wanted access to their data.

[00:03:37] So what's changed in customer behavior or technology to make that possible? Because there was a little bit of apprehension in the beginning and people confused how it would work. Would it affect Apple Pay? Would it affect their iMessages? All those kind of questions. But what has changed in the last few years? Yeah, look, a few years ago, it seemed was actually still something that it felt quite technical, if that makes sense. So not every device supported it. Many people did not really how or understood how it worked.

[00:04:06] And the experience, for sure, it was not intuitive. It required the installation process. Then the activation process is actually the connectivity working and whatnot. So again, a couple of things that they're not helping on simplifying that, right? But now this is very different. Most modern smartphones are now eSIM ready. The installation has become some... It's actually incredibly simple right now. And actually, travelers can keep their normal SIM active while using the eSIM for data abroad or for having these data abroad.

[00:04:33] So again, this is very important, by the way, because now you no longer feel like you're replacing your phone service. You're simply adding the connectivity for the trip. So actually, when that happens, the product becomes more easier to understand. So I think that happened. So that's one. The other one for me that is relevant is that the industry is going to understanding that connectivity is becoming almost invisible. You land, you turn your phone, and it just works. That's simple as it sounds.

[00:05:01] So actually, that's helping on this ratio of eSIM adoption worldwide. If you look, for example, at Europe, I think it's a good example. So Europe, we have obviously roaming is regulated. So within Europe, eSIM adoption is around 20%. But when Europeans are traveling outside the European Union, this is jumping to almost 45%. So again, in just a couple of years, this is just growing from non-existent to 45%.

[00:05:28] And again, this is going to continue growing because, again, due to this smartphone adoption and so on, again, this is going to go up. And just to bring to life everything we're talking about here, especially around the evolution of travel connectivity and eSIM technology, are you able to share maybe a traveler's story that shows the practical difference that reliable connectivity can make? Do you get to hear any stories like this? Yeah, you know, I'm always putting the same example.

[00:05:56] I mean, there's one situation that happens to me quite often. I'm traveling a lot, by the way. I mean, both for work and with my family. So again, this is the case. You arrive late at night in a country you do not know. You don't speak the language. You're trying to find a hotel. You need a taxi. Obviously, you don't want to get ripped off. So and then airport, Wi-Fi in the airport is no, it's not working, right? So I think we have all felt that anxiety at some point.

[00:06:23] This lack of peace of mind when you're suddenly realizing that, I mean, how dependent you are on the smartphone. So again, you need Maps, Google Maps. You need some kind of translator. You need to check the route. You need to even to simple let someone know that you read safely, right? So again, if your connectivity is already installed, it is actually working, all that anxiety disappears very quickly, right?

[00:06:47] So again, that's for me where this, again, with my personal case on how this eSIM thing, and specifically with Olafly, how thinking that this reliable connectivity, it's making such a practical difference when you're traveling. And I think that's a perfect case. It really is. And it's something that happened to me when I landed in Dubai about 18 months ago. I got roaming for US, so no problem there. But in Dubai, I was suddenly found myself in the middle of a country with just no Wi-Fi at all.

[00:07:16] I couldn't get any cabs or anything or buy anything. So I guess for people that have found themselves in a similar situation to that, can you walk me through what they would do when the plane lands, let's say, in Dubai or the US? They've got no data. Maybe they've put their phone straight on and no mobile data, don't use this because they don't want an expensive charge of $60, $70 almost instantly when they switch it on. How do they avoid that charge and activate an eSIM?

[00:07:44] Tell me, just talk me through that, just for anyone listening that has never encountered one before. Okay, so that's a very good question. And it depends on whether you're or not an Olafly customer. Why? Because if you're an average or normal consumer there, you need to download some app for some competitor or player in the eSIM. And you just select the number of days you want for that specific destination, in this case Dubai or whatever. And then you just pay for that. Okay, for us with Olafly, that's huge.

[00:08:11] I mean, that's very different because, again, we have launched a couple of months ago. We launched the new product, which is called, or new benefit, which is called the Always On. So just for being an Olafly customer, you're going to have always one gigabyte per month. So suddenly you just arrive there. And at some point, when you activate your eSIM, that's going to work directly. It's going to work. You have one gigabyte. Why? Because we want you to use that Google Maps to let your family know you have land safely and so on.

[00:08:39] So then just after that one gigabyte, for sure you will need to purchase a plan. But that's, for me, the huge difference in what we are framing up the perfect or ideal experience to simplify the process and to avoid this lack of peace of mind. And how do they switch? I apologize for asking this in a very simplistic way, but I know if I was to sell this to, let's say, one of my parents, for example, they will say, well, do I have my mobile data on still? How do I know it's using Olafly and not using my current mobile network?

[00:09:07] Okay, so typically what you need to do is, I mean, depending on the type of smartphone you have, but typically you need to deactivate your local, let's say, service. And then you just activate Olafly's eSIM here. So it's going to work directly, I mean, at the same moment. But again, depending on the smartphone, you will need to deactivate it manually. There are other versions that are, this is something that automatically you are going to have. Again, in this case, Olafly is eSIM.

[00:09:33] So better if you go there, Neil, and you manually just turn off the connectivity, the local connection. Awesome. And I'll include a video of things like that in the show notes just for people that want to try it for the first time. But what does the business model look like when, let's say, customers expect instant activation, transparent pricing and coverage across many different countries? Tell me more about that and the pricing aspect. Right.

[00:09:57] What is interesting about this business is that you're taking something that used to be very physical and very local, and then you're turning it into a global digital product. Again, we're operating in more than 200 markets. So you can imagine how global this is. Historically, connectivity means having these physical SIM cards, retail stores, local distribution. That was a very fragmented experience from country to country. The experience was actually quite different. But now it seems that much of that actually is disappearing.

[00:10:27] So on one hand side, you still need strong relationships with mobile operators. This is obvious, but you ultimately, connectivity is depending on the quality of the local networks. I mean, this is very clear. But on the other side, the product itself can now be delivered digitally almost instantly anywhere in the world. So this is changing all the different steps of that distribution. So connectivity can be sold directly to the traveler.

[00:10:51] It can also be integrated into airlines, travel agencies, ODAs, financial platforms, different parts of the travel journey. And then the business model, it becomes much more scalable because you combine both global networks partnerships with digital delivery and increasingly with distribution and web into the places where people are already planning their trips. So again, that's changing the way we think about pricing.

[00:11:18] That's changing the way we're looking at even marketing acquisition channels as well. Right? So that's a bit of the big shift we're experiencing now. And it is incredibly cool what you guys are doing. It wasn't too long ago I found myself in a country queuing up at some random newspaper stall just to find a SIM card and looking for the little thing to take the SIM out. Removing that problem completely is incredibly cool. And there's no going back for me, certainly.

[00:11:44] So for you guys, I mean, where do network partnerships, regulation or even device compatibility, how do these things create the hardest operational problems? This, again, is probably one of the most interesting parts of the industry. Because for you as a customer, the experience looks incredibly simple. Again, from the outside, from your perspective. But internally, customer chooses the destination, buys the plan, installs it, and then expects it to work.

[00:12:12] Again, internally, that simple experience, it requires a lot of complexity. Going back to the network quality, it can't vary from one country to another. Obviously, well, and even within one country. If you're in the middle of the jungle in Colombia, I mean, obviously that's going to change compared to being in Bogota. Right? So you need strong career relationships. You need redundancy. You need the ability to move traffic between networks when necessary. So then you have the device complexity.

[00:12:39] I was speaking a little bit about this before, but not every phone behaves in exactly the same way. You still have different models, carrier-logged devices, regional hardware differences, and so on. So, again, then you have the regulation, which can be completely different from one market to the other. And actually, the real challenge is managing all of that complexity without making the customer feel any of it.

[00:13:06] So, again, making very simple for the customer is going to be really difficult for us. And that's, for me, one of the paradoxes of this industry, right? Yeah, 100%. And I would imagine for most people listening, if they've got a trip planned and they want an eSIM, the first thing they're going to do is either go to traditional search or ask their AI assistant what is the most data I can get for the best price and compare all the eSIM providers.

[00:13:32] And, of course, charts like that can be to a certain degree. So, for people listening, how should they compare an eSIM service beyond that headline price and data allowance? Funny enough, from my perspective, by the way, but when you want to compare eSIM providers, it's better if you look beyond the moment of purchase. Because, actually, obviously, price matters, of course. I mean, this is priority one for us. But when you're traveling, the priorities will change.

[00:14:00] Again, what really matters at that moment is what happens after you land. Some questions will appear here, like how reliable is the network? What happens if coverage is poor in one specific area? Am I constantly checking how much data do I have left? What will happen if something goes wrong, by the way? How quickly can someone help you? And that is, by the way, a very special, especially important point here. Because when you're at home, again, going back to this point, but when you're at home,

[00:14:27] you're planning your trip, price fails or may feel like this is number one priority. But actually, when you're abroad, your connectivity's not working. Suddenly, time becomes the number one priority. That's why we're offering services for our customers, such as having the 24-7 support in your own language, by the way, as part of the product itself. We're trying to bring all of this together around this idea of having total peace of mind for you as a customer.

[00:14:56] Limited data, transparent pricing, reliable connectivity, support when you need it, and so on. Because we don't want our customers to think that or think about gigabytes during the trip. I mean, we want them to just engage or get the best out of that trip, thinking about the trip the moment they're traveling, and stop thinking about, again, the cost, the gigabytes, the support, the connectivity quality, and so on.

[00:15:23] And historically, some mobile operators have seen eSIM providers as partners, and others will see them as competitors. Has that relationship changed? Has that evolved? What are you seeing here? I think that the relationship is becoming much more nuanced than simple saying that we are competitors or we are partners. From the traveler's perspective, I'm always going, Neil, to the traveler's perspective. I mean, we need to start from there.

[00:15:50] But for them, eSIM providers are clearly an alternative to traditional roaming. I mean, this is very clear. But at the same time, if you think mobile operators are essential partners, because ultimately, the travel is connecting through their networks. So we, as well, find it to partner with them, right? So both things can be true at once. And another thing is that as the category is growing, those partners are becoming much more shodate. So this is no longer about buying data wholesale.

[00:16:18] It is more about improving network quality, building better integrations from a technical perspective, creating redundancy, making the experience much more reliable, and so on. So I don't think the future is travel, eSIM providers replacing mobile operators. I don't think any of the eSIM companies, they have these on their strategies. I think the future is more on the interconnected ecosystem, if that makes sense, where operators can provide the network, all the infrastructure, the telco infrastructure,

[00:16:47] and the specialized global players make that connectivity simple, make that connectivity transparent, and make that connectivity accessible to the rest of the travelers. I love that you mentioned there about keeping that transparent. And on that side of things, what security, privacy, or even customer support risks are easy to miss when connectivity becomes that downloadable product. Anything you've learned here? Yeah. Going back to my point of, for the customer, this needs to be, I mean,

[00:17:17] everything needs to become more and more simpler, while this is obviously the product is becoming digital, I mean, or completely digital in this case. So the first thing for me is security and privacy. Think about it. I mean, you're actually downloading connectivity profile onto your phone. You need to know that you're buying something from a trust provider. This security and privacy policies, this provisioning the process that it's secure and so on. I mean, your personal information is behind that. So we need to handle that properly.

[00:17:45] The second thing here for me, it's the network architecture. So two scenes can look exactly the same on your phone, but the experience behind them can be very different. So how your data is rooted, which networks you're connected to, or even where that traffic goes when you have real impact on the speed, on the latency, the access to certain local services. I mean, some of the key metrics we're using within the industry.

[00:18:12] But then you have something that we have talked about already, which is support. If something goes wrong during the installation, if something goes wrong while you're arriving, you might be in that strange situation where you need internet access immediately, because you need to solve that problem, right? So again, for me, those are a little bit of the three or four things that are changing on what do I think, why it's so important to create and build on top of those.

[00:18:40] And so much has changed over the last decade. I mean, if we go back, what, 10 years ago, I think an iPhone contract for something like $80 a month for 18 months, then that went to two years. Now it's very often even three years. So you're paying. And then now I think Apple in the US have said you could subscribe to your phone. You don't have to buy a phone, just have a subscription there. Then all you need is a cheap SIM. So many traditional SIM providers are starting to struggle there. And I'm wondering if we look further into the future,

[00:19:09] if people maybe subscribe to their phone instead of buying one and then use an eSIM for everyday connectivity, not just as travel. Who benefits and who could be left behind, do you think? How do you see this all continuing to evolve? I think it's obvious, but the winner is always the consumer. Need to be the consumer, the traveler in this case for us, because for me, Neil, there are a lot of legal and technical boundaries.

[00:19:35] So that having the eSIM to be working locally is not that easy, again, from a legal perspective. But going back to the eSIM, it fundamentally gives people more flexibility and more choice when they are traveling abroad. You can now keep your normal number on your primary SIM active, as I was planning before, and then add this other connectivity provider. And this is actually happening in a matter of minutes right now. So you no longer, this is again going back obvious, but you no longer need this physical change.

[00:20:05] You don't need to travel with five different SIMs because you're going to visit five different destinations or markets. So again, for me, what is particularly interesting here is that the benefits are going much farther than just the consumer. So for example, once connectivity becomes a digital product, it can become part of the broader travel ecosystem. So now an airline, OTA, travel agency, or even a hotel company, I mean, they can integrate connectivity directly into the customer journey.

[00:20:34] And we have seen now this with Revoload and N26x and other new banks. So again, mobile operators can reach international customers through those new wholesale and those new distribution partnerships. So again, the distribution channels are actually changing as well. So this entire ecosystem can be developed around this something that historically was a very local telco physical product,

[00:20:59] but you have one risk, which is that not everybody can move at the same speed. So there are some people that are still using the older devices. They don't have ASIN support. They don't have these carrier load phones and so on. So again, for me that it's important. It's the challenge for the industry that we should not define progress simply by how sophisticated the technology becomes. The real measure for me, it's how we are internally measuring progress

[00:21:28] is whether we can make that technology simple enough so that almost anyone, every traveler can use it. And as we're talking about travel here and holiday season, et cetera, I've got to ask you, we have a Amazon wish list. I'm sure you read when you're traveling all around the world as well. Is there a book that you've come across that we can add to our Amazon wish list? You know, for me, I will recommend Hacking Growth by St. Alice and Morgan Brown.

[00:21:56] And there is why I'm always, by the way, I'm recommending this one. There are three big ideas that I will like from the book. The first one is now you need a much broader understanding of how a business works. My background, for example, is strategy. But today, that's not enough. I mean, you need to understand data analytics. You need to understand marketing and acquisition channels. You need to understand consumer behavior. You need to understand product. You need to understand technology. You need to understand design and so on.

[00:22:24] So again, not because you need to be an expert, but because you need to understand how the pieces connect together. The second one that I really like is experimentation. You can't assume you know what will work. And here for the ESM industry, it's quite important because we're launching new services, new functionalities, new features, and so on. So, but we always test them first. We measure, we learn, and then we iterate continuously before we launch. And this is particularly important in these kind of fast moving markets.

[00:22:55] And the third one is the cross-functional collaboration. I'm going here on more on the internal way of managing companies, but growth rarely belongs to one team. The problems that you're traveling or trying to solve, I don't care if this is about support, about the installation process, about the career quality, about marketing. I don't care. But you will need all of them to define a unified vision around all this, right? So you need to be able to work across all those functions and understand them.

[00:23:25] And by the way, with that one, I want to introduce the AI here because AI is accelerating all these three, right? So for me, this book, This Hacking Growth, isn't just a book about growth. It's more about a framework for how modern teams, modern businesses, and modern scale-ups and startups need to operate. Fantastic. I will get that added straight to our Amazon wish list. For anybody listening, maybe they've heard about eSIMS in the past,

[00:23:51] felt a little bit intimidated that it was too technological for them. And obviously, we've demystified it today. It's incredibly easy to get up and running. But if anybody listening is ready to try one out on their next trip, tell me where they can find more information on your website and also what they can expect when they arrive there and how they can get up and running. Okay, clear. So the best place to find us is actually AllFly's app. By the way, I would definitely recommend everyone hearing, downloading before your next international trip

[00:24:21] because, of course, we also have the website, by the way, alloflight.com. But within AllFly, what you will find is as simple as selecting the destination you're traveling to, the number of days, and then you push it up. If you're a recurring customer, we do have the loyalty program. We do have other benefits such as the always-on thing that I just shared and so on. But again, that's the best way of interacting with AllFly. We do have the LinkedIn space. We do have, if you want to go some little deeper,

[00:24:50] we do have the inside AllFly, where people from across the different teams of the company are sharing their perspectives. And then we do have some eSIM talks on YouTube and some other content we're developing. But for sure, priority one for me, it's actually AllFly app. So hopefully on your next international trip, you'll be traveling with us. Awesome. And my big message from this really is for every single person listening, if you've ever been overseas and been hit by an obscenely high roaming charge,

[00:25:19] I know I've been there in the past. I suspect everyone has. You don't have to do that again. If you go over to techtalksnetwork.com as well, there will be a blog post associated with this episode. I will include all the links that you've just mentioned, along with some videos that I might find from your channels there, just to make it nice and easy. Go and have a look. And let's try and finally retire those horrendous roaming charges once and for all. So great work what you're doing. Love how you're leveraging technology to bring all this to life

[00:25:48] in a way that everybody can understand. Incredibly cool. But thank you for sharing your story today. Thanks to you, Neil. It was a pleasure. So thanks to you and all the audience. Massive thank you to my guests for joining me today and sharing a few stories there on how quickly our priorities change once the plane lands on the tarmac. Price might dominate the buying decision at home, but network reliability, fast support, and the ability to reach a hotel or a family member

[00:26:17] suddenly matter far more than when that connection fails when you're overseas. And Alfonso also reminded us that simple digital products often depend on considerable operational work behind the screen, whether that be operator relationships, network redundancy to different devices and local regulation. So my big practical takeaway after listening today

[00:26:44] is install and test an eSIM before leaving home. Then check how the provider handles support and poor coverage rather than comparing data allowances alone. You need a little bit more than just 10 gig for X amount of dollars. And if you go over to techtalksnetwork.com, there will be a blog post associated with this. I'm going to try and pack as much information, including videos and guides and things. So if you are new to eSIM, you should be able to get up and running nice and easily. But over to you,

[00:27:13] if you're new or a seasoned traveler and an expert at this, has an eSIM changed the way that you travel? Or are those roaming chargers still catching you out? Again, techtalksnetwork.com. You can leave me an audio message over there. Let me know your thoughts, which providers you prefer. I'd love to hear from you. But that's it for today. I've taken up far too much of your time. Thanks for listening as always. Safe travels. Bye for now.