

There's a new Wi-Fi provider coming to your local Starbucks, and this one is offering some of its services for free. Outmaneuvering its smaller rival T-Mobile, AT&T announced on Monday a new partnership with the coffee giant to start offering its own brand of Wi-Fi services this spring.

Once the rollout is complete, those who use Starbucks Cards will also be able to browse for up to two hours free at 7,000 Starbucks locations in the U.S, the wireless provider said. Additionally, coffee drinkers without a Starbucks Card can purchase tiered access to the AT&T Wi-Fi network at Starbucks for $4 for two hours. Monthly membership will also be offered at $20 per month, compared to T-Mobile's current rates of $6 an hour, $10 a day, and $30 per month.

Monday's deal also means AT&T is now set to completely replace T-Mobile as the main Wi-Fi provider at various U.S.-based Starbucks locations. The relationship between T-Mobile and Starbucks will all but end once rollout is complete, a Starbucks spokesperson confirmed.

"This was part of a larger strategic decision on our part," she said of Monday's announcement, adding that AT&T was simply an "ideal partner," who also happens to have provided Starbucks with point of sale and other store operating systems for 10 years. As such, the Wi-Fi deal was characterized as an expansion of an existing, successful relationship, not a condemnation of T-Mobile and its services.

So where does this leave T-Mobile HotSpot customers? According to Starbucks, subscribers will be able to access AT&T's Wi-Fi services at no extra cost due for quite some time due to a separate roaming deal between AT&T and T-Mobile.

"T-Mobile HotSpot customers can continue to access Wi-Fi services at Starbucks now and for years to come," said Joe Sims, vice president and general manager of the company's Broadband Products and Services Group, in a Monday statement.

T-Mobile has been the exclusive wireless Wi-Fi provider in more than 5,000 Starbucks since 2001 and has even used this partnership to promote many of its own services. One of those is the recently launched UMA service, HotSpots@Home, which lets customers with supported phones switch between the cell network and Wi-Fi HotSpots.

And while the relationship between T-Mobile and Starbucks appears to be coming to an end later this year, a T-Mobile representative confirmed with EPICENTER the new deal with AT&T will in no way compromise the company's commitment to its own HotSpot Network.

If you're an iPhone owner and are wondering how the new deal affects you, apparently the answer is not at all. In September Apple announced a new partnership with Starbucks and T-Mobile to let iPhone and iPod touch users to access T-Mobile's HotSpots for free in order to download and listen to music via the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store. That iTunes Wi-Fi Store partnership is still in effect, but will contiue under under AT&T's Wi-Fi service.

Other than that, iPhone owners shouldn't expect any other preferential treatment or special access at Starbucks in the near term.

"This offer is for AT&T broadband customers who can access Wi-Fi in the stores over a Wi-Fi-enabled device. [iPhone users] who are not broadband subscribers can't access for free at this time," AT&T spokesperson Brad Mays told Ars Technica.

Photo: Flickr/taminator