Ice Wireless is pulling out of Whitehorse.

Effective tomorrow, the company will no longer serve the city, it has advised its customers.

Stanley Noel is a director with Ice Wireless and the chief executive officer of one of the company's major investors, the Yukon Indian Development Corp.

In an interview this morning, he said the cell phone service provider is pulling out of the the city for business reasons.

'The reality is the company did not take off in Whitehorse,' Noel told the Star.

'The reason is competition; there are two other competitors in the Whitehorse market,' he said.

Going head-to-head against Latitude Wireless and Bell Mobility made surviving in the Yukon's capital a difficult proposition, he added.

'We had problems in the beginning hooking up to the towers ... unfortunately, the market wasn't kind to newcomers.'

Ice Wireless, he added, will continue operating in the Northwest Territories in the communities of Yellowknife and Inuvik.

Noel said the company is currently trying to direct about 280 long-term customers to other service providers.

It will be providing refunds to people who had only recently signed up with Ice Wireless.

'I think it's unfortunate the product isn't staying; the Whitehorse market has received some advantages,' Noel said.

He's noticed Ice's competitors in the city have brought down their prices in recent months, he added.

'The decreasing prices, I'm sure you'll see a halt to those.'

Rick Steele, with the Yukon Technology Innovation Centre, said this morning he believes IT is a difficult business to get into in the territory. He feels it's unfortunate the city is losing a competitor in the cellular phone market.

'Invariably, when you lose a competitor in the market, it's a concern.

'It's always a challenge; we've had lots of competition in a small market,' he said.

'To try to start up an IT business here right now, it's a challenge.'

Steele said he believes the technology employed by Ice, which used the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), may have been a little ahead of its time.

The GSM system is quite compatible with European users, he added, with the North American market leaning more toward the Wideband Code Division Multiple Access technology, known as CDMA.

One technology, he added, isn't necessarily better than the other.

He said while he doesn't feel Ice's choice of technology is the reason the company didn't fare well in the Whitehorse market, it could have added to its difficulties.

'It's certainly a consideration in their business case,' he said.