Launching a UK mobile network: the 90-day path
From scoping call to first ported number: what actually happens, in what order, and where launches go sideways.
Days 0-15: scope like you mean it
Products, price points, audience and support model, decided before integration starts. The scoping call exists to compress this: partners who arrive with a one-page proposition launch weeks earlier than partners who discover it mid-build.
Days 15-45: integrate the thin slice
Catalogue, purchase, activation, porting. Resist building everything: the portal does everything the API does, so your ops team is never blocked on engineering. Set up 'install', 'first-use' and 'usage' webhooks now; adding them after launch is how support queues are born.
Days 45-70: test with real SIMs, real numbers
Port a test number in and out. Run the whole journey on both eSIM and physical SIM. Break your own top-up flow on purpose. Every defect found here is a refund not issued later.
Days 70-90: soft launch to a friendly hundred
A controlled cohort exposes the questions your FAQ missed and the copy your customers misread, while volumes are small enough to fix quietly. Then open the doors.
Where launches go sideways
Top three pitfalls, all of them fixable.
- Pricing still being debated past day 30 – decide now, iterate once you're live.
- Support left until after launch, when it's the part of your product customers actually talk to – staff it before you go live.
- Porting tested on a single number – run it in batches, in and out, before you trust it.