I have spent lots of time and a fair amount of money in developing cellular weather stations. Here is some hard won knowledge that might explain the situation.
The big cell companies are very hard to work with directly, especially for a little guy. And CDMA networks are harder to get on than GSM networks. Verizon's buy-in is steep at at least $25K to get a new device tested and approved to run on their network. That's THEIR fees, hardware design and construction not included.
AT&T was a little less, but has a monthly minimum billing after 18 months of $2500.
So, you need to find an MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator) as the intermediary between you and the big carriers. They buy data in bulk, and resell it to little guys at a markup.
I can build cellular weather stations all day long. However, most people don't want to pay the costs. My first cellular weather station was built on a Davis VP2 and serial weatherlink, our custom WeatherElement Data Hub, a BlueTree Verizon cell router, and the cheapest Verizon data only plan they had, $40/month for 250 GB. The hardware totaled somewhere around $1,300, and runs off the site's 12 VDC solar system.
For WeatherLab, that's where I got my education. I did lots of research, made a lot of calls, tested with 3 carriers, and finally found one I could work with.
The WeatherLabs are custom drop-in Davis SIM board replacements designed by my engineer in Australia, requiring the addition of a 5 watt solar panel. They are GSM, and, through clever programming, and aggressive selection of the MVNO which uses T-Mobile's network (I'm getting the monthly SIM card service plus data for less than an AT&T reseller's SIM only monthly charge), we got our end user cost for data down to $10/month for 10 minute updates. Unfortunately, the REV B boards are out of stock and production, while the REV c board is still in design.
As a result, a while back, I found another affordable solution, the Zoom Telephonics 4530 cell router. It was GSM/SIM card, so my WeatherLab SIM cards worked in them no problem. I replaced the Verizon router with a Zoom, and saved a lot of money every month. However, it uses more power than the WeatherLab SIM replacement, ans, lacking shore power, requires a larger solar array.
Unfortunately, just as I was preparing to quote a 5 station system, the 4530 went out of production. The Zoom follow-on product will be AT&T only (no PCS channels) so it will be of little use to me unless I find a willing (affordable) AT&T partner.
As far as Vantage Connect, I understand they use T-Mobile as well.
Having said all that, I still have the Verizon router. If you want a station built on Verizon, I can do it, and I'll make you a deal on the router. Check with them and see what you can get for a data only plan. At $40/month, I'd have to mark it up $10 to make it worth my trouble.
Or, send me the lat/lon of your proposed location, and I'll check the T-Mobile coverage map. If it's in a fringe area, judicious selection of the outdoor antenna might work, compared to the crappy lil antenna in a cell phone.. I still have one un-used Zoom router here.
There are 2 other options that will work. We've done both of them. The first is an old laptop with a Verizon AirCard, and Internet Connection Sharing enabled. The second is a Verizon MyFi wireless hotspot and a wireless to Ethernet adapter. It's a kludge but it works.
If anyone knows of affordable cellular routers with Ethernet ports, please let me know.
