GigaOM » Access Point

Telkom Indonesia bets big on Wi-Fi, plans 100,000 access points

Kevin Fitchard — Fri, 07 Dec 2012 16:43:24 +0000

Asian operators are starting to think of Wi-Fi on a monumental scale. PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia has signed up with Cisco Systems for a 100,000-node Wi-Fi offload network in malls, schools, hotels, hotspots and public areas.

Those access points will be used to shunt traffic off of Telkom’s cellular data networks, greatly increasing their overall capacity. Cisco said that these access points will be Passpoint certified, which means customers will be able to automatically connect and authenticate to them whenever they’re in range.

That network is big, but it’s actually the second network of its size in Asia. Last year Japan’s KDDI deployed a 100,000-node network using Ruckus Wireless gear. Though the networks are the same size, Telkom has a lot more ground to cover. It has 22.8 million residential customers (using either wireline or fixed wireless access technologies) and 107 million wireless customers spread across the sprawling archipelago nation. That means it will have a Wi-Fi node for every 1,000 mobile customers.

KDDI is a smaller operator, with about 40 million customers, meaning there’s an access point for about 400 customers. But compared to other global Wi-Fi deployments, both operators are being very aggressive. In the U.S., AT&T has been the most pro-Wi-Fi mobile carrier, and it has a hotspot for every 4000 subscribers. In some cases, though, AT&T has deployed multiple access points in hotspot clusters so its density is higher.

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U.S. Cellular builds a virtual Wi-Fi network with Devicescape

Kevin Fitchard — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 18:15:49 +0000

U.S. Cellular has added its name to the growing roster of carriers looking to ease their mobile data burdens by tapping into the enormous pool of open Wi-Fi available in the public plazas, coffee shops and businesses. On Thursday the Chicago-based regional operator revealed it is contracting with Devicescape to use its virtual hotspot network on nearly 8 million Wi-Fi nodes.

Tapping into Wi-Fi to offload smartphone 3G and 4G traffic isn’t new. Carriers such as AT&T have built big networks of public hotspots for just that purpose. But since all of those hotspots are either owned or managed by the carriers and their partners, there’s a limit to far they can scale. Devicescape calls its network “virtual” because it doesn’t actually own or manage any of the hotspots it connects to. Instead it relies on its freely available smartphone and PC software to crowdsource information on more than hundred million open access points globally.

Currently, Devicescape has more than 8.6 million access points in its virtual network, of which 7.8 million are available in the US. In comparison, AT&T has 30,000. What’s more Devicescape is constantly expanding its number of hotspots. The clients loaded into customers’ phones are constantly scanning the airwaves for more open Wi-Fi, so the more U.S. Cellular subscribers use the service, the more access points they’ll eventually have available to them.

In addition to U.S .Cellular, Devicescape is working with virtual operator Republic Wireless, MetroPCS and Intel in the US, and with Bouygues in France. For U.S. Cellular, the network will be of particular use in its primary metro market Chicago. Not only does the city have a dense concentration of open Wi-Fi, but it has the densest concentration of US Cellular customers competing for time on its 3G network. U.S. Cellular has launched LTE in other parts of its footprint, but it doesn’t yet have the spectrum to offer 4G in the windy city.

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Boingo gravitates toward “free” Wi-Fi with Cloud Nine purchase

Kevin Fitchard — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 14:41:22 +0000

Consumers are increasingly expecting free Wi-Fi in public spaces, so one of the world’s biggest hotspot providers is adjusting its business model accordingly. Boingo has acquired Cloud Nine Media, which manages sponsorship deals for Wi-Fi access in more than 6000 airports, hotels bars and restaurants in the U.S. and Canada.

You may have already seen some of Cloud Nine’s works in a few major airports. When logging into a hotspot, instead of getting the usual registration and payment screen, a terms-of-use page pops up offering to show you a video or ads in exchange for 30 minutes or more of free Wi-Fi access. AT&T is launching a similar service at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport this September.

Boingo had been testing the sponsored Wi-Fi model working with Google Offers to provide ad-supported Wi-Fi in New York City subways and with American Express to do the same at a handful or airports. According to Christian Gunning, Boingo VP of corporate communications, sponsored Wi-Fi has been in increasing demand especially as Boingo expands beyond airports and convention centers into more consumer-centric locations such as malls, restaurants and stadiums where the expectations are much higher that Wi-Fi should be gratis. Gunning said in an email interview:

“… [W]e’ve historically outsourced this capability. As our consumer segment growth continued (and along with it the need for more sponsored access), it became evident that having this capability in-house would be beneficial. Cloud Nine Media has built a strong business specializing in the delivery of sponsored Wi-Fi. They have a proprietary sponsorship platform that gives us the ability to deliver these sponsorships ourselves, as well as generate valuable data for sponsors. Bringing advertising/sponsorship expertise in-house puts us in a much stronger position to fulfill corporate goals.”

Boingo runs a global hotspot of network of 500,000 hotspots, though don’t expect every hotspot it owns or manages to suddenly stop taking credit cards. Many of its restaurant and café venue partners already offer Wi-Fi free to the public as a means of attracting customers – Boingo just signed a deal with Wendy’s to connect thousands of fast food restaurants. But the biggest part of Boingo’s business comes from subscriptions, which allows laptop, smartphone and mobile device customers to instantly connect to its global hotspot network for a monthly fee.

It’s likely Boingo will run the “free” service and the subscription service in parallel, generating revenue from non-subscribers through advertising while charging its customers monthly fees to access the same hotspot. The benefit of the subscription model, though, is that it treats all of Boingo’s disparate hotspots as a single network. Subscribers with the proper software on their devices not only bypass advertising, they don’t have register at every hotspot they encounter.

Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed, though Boingo may be more forthcoming on the financial details at its earnings call scheduled Wednesday afternoon.

Airport image courtesy of Flickr user Michal Osmenda; Wi-Fi image courtesy of Flickr user suttonhoo

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Seamless Wi-Fi on your smartphone could quickly become reality

Kevin Fitchard — Tue, 08 May 2012 17:46:04 +0000

Soon our smartphones will automatically connect to carriers’ Wi-Fi hotspots thanks to the Wi-Fi Alliance’s new Passpoint certification. Although the Wi-Fi Alliance won’t accept its first devices for certification until late June, there may not be much of a lag time before it hits consumer phones — and other devices.

Wi-Fi Alliance marketing director Kelly Davis-Felner said the Alliance isn’t expecting vendors to submit just new smartphones, tablets and access points to its labs for Passpoint certification, but also the huge body of existing devices and equipment already in the market – upgraded with new Hotspot 2.0 software. Once that old gear receives certification, vendors can push that software out to millions of access points and Wi-Fi enabled handsets.

That means unlike the usual wireless network cycles, we won’t have to wait for next-generation equipment and new gadgets to gradually make their way into the market. “There are millions of access points out there,” Davis-Felner said. “Hopefully they upgrade sooner rather than later.”

The Alliance has already pre-certified a core set of access points and handsets that will serve as a testbed against which the Alliance will compare submissions. The handsets that emerge from the Alliance’s labs will be able to seamlessly authenticate to Passpoint-compliant hotspots without futzing about with network IDs and passwords.

Don’t expect your phone to start automatically logging into every access point in sight though. Essentially Passpoint and Hotspot 2.0 will make it easy to log in to carrier-owned and-managed access points, and right now there aren’t a heck of a lot of them. AT&T has been the most aggressive deploying its own hotspots, but most of the other U.S. operators only use them for spot coverage.

But Davis-Felner said Passpoint certification may well provide the extra push for U.S. operators to get more aggressive about Wi-Fi. The big thing holding back large-scale carrier Wi-Fi adoption is the login issue. Once Hotspot 2.0 solves that problem, they will have the incentive to expand their own Wi-Fi networks and sign deals hotspot providers like Boingo or Time Warner Cable.

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The Home Wi-Fi Reboot: Don't Neglect It

Samuel Dean — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 23:00:09 +0000

Are you a web worker who depends heavily on a home Wi-Fi network? There are more and more of us, and I’ve written before about the importance of doing regular checkups on your wireless network to make sure you’re getting the best performance. Recently, my home Wi-Fi network was giving me some trouble, and I went down the steps in the trusty troubleshooting checklist and was able to get rid of the problem.

Here’s the common problem I had, and how I fixed it.

I frequently like to write and work on a laptop, so that I can move from room to room. A home Wi-Fi network is great for this, and I can even get a good signal outside my home most of the time.

However, recently I found my Wi-Fi signal getting dropped at regular intervals, which is really very annoying. In instances where that happens, you just use a sniffer utility to reestablish the connection, but it’s annoying to have to do so. I have a secure Wi-Fi network, and though I wasn’t exactly sure what the problem was, I knew it wasn’t interference from neighboring networks.

One important thing I learned a long time ago is that a Wi-Fi network needs a cycled reboot of all essential components on a regular basis. This means turn off the computer that your router is attached to, turn off your broadband, physically disconnect the modem and router connections, turn off and physically disconnect your access points, turn off portable devices hanging on the network, and then reconnect and start everything back up again.

I actually learned the value of that on a support call years ago when I got my first Wi-Fi network installed. It makes perfect sense. How many times have you solved a computing problem by rebooting, or shutting down an application and going back in?

After a cycled reboot, I was pretty sure that my dropped Wi-Fi problem was solved, but as an added step, I changed the channels on my router and access points. I learned about the importance of this through some reader comments to this post here on WWD. I recommend taking a look at them and following the links provided if you’re having any Wi-Fi problems at home. Here is a good tutorial on channels and changes from Wi-Fi Planet.

After this second step, I never have had another problem with signal drops. Truth be told, I’m not exactly sure what my problem was, but I’m pretty sure I was running into some kind of interference. Many electronic devices in a home can create radio interference, so if you’ve been experiencing signal drops, try the steps described here.

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Up with Downfly

Om Malik — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 22:45:39 +0000

For the past few days I have been trying out Downfly, a Firefox extension that allows you to email webpage links to one or more of your friends, without having to cut-and-paste the URL in your email message. That sounds simple enough, but what really is interesting is that Downfly can track where those links go, i.e., if any of your friends forward them to others.

Think of it as yet-another twist on bookmarking services that litter the tech landscape. But one of the reasons I got intrigued by this extension is because it fits into my theory of ultra-personal social networks. My good friend Pip Coburn calls it extreme personalization.

The social networks that matter are the ones which are the closest to you – one or two degrees of separation. A good example would be folks in your Phone’s address book or contacts on your PC. These are the people, whose opinions (and relationships) are more important than to some random person. So if they like a bookmark, there is a good chance I will too. Downfly does precisely that.

Downfly is the brainchild of 20-something programmer, Billy Chasen who has working on this for past year and is backed by angel funding from John Borthwick, Seth Goldstein and Brad Reifler. “The idea behind is that most other services are about comments, votes or clicks. This is about your personal social network’s validation of a link,” says Chasen, “which makes these links more valuable. “

When you sign-up for the service, import your contacts and basically create groups. You can email the links to a specific person, or to an entire group. The more a link gets sent around, the higher the authority (and relevance) of that link. You can subscribe to other people’s Downfly (if they make it public.)

The best part is that recpients of the links don’t need to use the plug-in or download one. The service goes one step further and emails them a compiled list of the links sent to their email (from you and anyone else who sent to them) as one simple digest, at a set time.

The site is butt-ugly, but that shouldn’t dissuade you from trying this service. And even if you don’t care about this service as much, you would be helping a one-man company with your comments and feedback.

Check out this video to get a better idea how Downfly works.

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