Not really. I'm on Visible Wireless prepay and pay $25/month for unlimited data, including unlimited hotspot (rate limited at 5 mb/s on the hotspot).

If it's a post-pay plan, then it might be competitive, as the rates are around what you remember for those. Since they're talking about a $500 phone instead of "free with plan," I'm assuming it's prepaid where you have to buy the phone separately.

Edit: okay, read the article and it's prepaid. It's not a good value and is easily beat my several existing services.