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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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A burger, fries and Wi-Fi: Boingo connects Wendy’s fast food joints

Kevin Fitchard — Thu, 02 Aug 2012 23:31:57 +0000

Boingo’s already extensive Wi-Fi hotspot network is about to get a little bigger (and perhaps a little greasier). The Wi-Fi aggregator has signed a deal with The Wendy’s Company to install and manage access points in its US and Canadian restaurants.

There are about 6000 Wendy’s locations in North America, but they won’t all necessary get Wi-Fi. According to a spokesperson, Boingo is gradually expanding Wendy’s hotspot footprint from a pilot of several dozen locations to the rest of the Wendy’s company-owned restaurants, but Wendy’s independent franchises will make the call on whether to participate in the program. Nearly three-quarters of Wendy’s restaurants are franchised, so there’s no guarantee that any given restaurant will participate.

Still, the deal could add more beef (get it?) to Boingo’s growing network, which now encompasses 500,000 managed hotspots globally. Boingo and its partners’ subscribers will connect automatically to the Wendy’s hotspots when they enter a participating restaurant, while all others will be able to login for free once accepting Wendy’s terms and conditions.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Sister72

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Republic Wireless hybrid Wi-Fi strategy takes shape; invites in new customers

Kevin Fitchard — Tue, 31 Jul 2012 16:20:15 +0000

After running in closed beta for the better part of the year, Bandwidth.com’s virtual operator Republic Wireless is finally opening up its dirt-cheap $19 a month unlimited voice, SMS and data plans to new customers. It’s launching a new smartphone to boot, the Motorola Defy XT. The device is a heavy duty Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) phone Republic is selling for $249, but there’s something special below the faceplate.

According to Republic, it’s the first device fully integrated with its proprietary hybrid cellular-Wi-Fi connection management software. Republic isn’t just reselling off-the-shelf devices. It’s delving deep into the Android stack to change the way the phone connects the network, prioritizing wireless LAN connections over cellular and transforming circuit-switched mobile calls to VoIP-over-Wi-Fi whenever possible.

The savings from shunting all of that traffic to Wi-Fi – rather than pay wholesale voice and data partner Sprint for network airtime – allow Republic to keep its prices low and maintain that endangered species of mobile services, the unlimited and unthrottled data plan. Republic not only leverages its customers’ home and office Wi-Fi networks, but it has signed a deal with Devicescape to access a “virtual” hotspot network of 7.8 million open access points. In the U.S., where Devicescape’s network is the densest, the Wi-Fi aggregator has seen traffic offload rates as high as 40 percent among its customers, according to Devicescape CEO Dave Fraser.

Republic has actually been using Devicescape’s technology in a limited fashion for months, loading its connection management client into the first wave of LG Optimus smartphones it shipped. But by combining Devicescape’s technology with its own hybrid calling software, Republic says can now fully realize its Wi-Fi-first strategy and is thus ready to open the flood gates to new users.

The company is still is in beta, but according to a spokesman the company’s waiting list is now more than 100,000 prospective customers long, and Republic is now letting those people onto the network “in waves.” Republic hasn’t revealed how many people it allowed into the first beta round, but it said it is now ready to scale its business. Here’s what Republic GM Brian Dally had to say in the carrier’s blog:

Members of republic are better equipped than ever before to take advantage of Wi-Fi’s fullest potential, helping to make smartphones affordable for millions more in the process. That’s important at a time when Big Cell is busy making more money at higher prices, with more restrictions and continued confusing business practices.

Republic will be the first operator to carry the water-resistant Moto Defy XT, which sports a 3.7-inch Gorilla Glass display, 1 GHz apps processor and 5 MP camera. Republic is also encouraging its existing customers to upgrade to the new device, offering Optimus users a $100 discount if they buy the Moto smartphone.

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5 cable companies cut the cord, offer free Wi-Fi roaming

Kevin C. Tofel — Mon, 21 May 2012 13:46:24 +0000

A wireless network comprised of 50,000 free hotspots will appear in the coming months, but there’s a small catch: To use the free Wi-Fi service, you’ll need to be a subscriber to one of five cable television providers. On Monday, Bright House Networks, Cablevision, Comcast, Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable jointly announced the CableWiFi network. Customers of one provider can seamlessly roam on hotspots from other four as a result of the news.

Most of the new roaming functionality will be in New York City and the surrounding Tri-State area, Los Angeles, Tampa, Orlando, and Philadelphia as those areas have overlapping cable and Wi-Fi coverage. The group will be adding more cities and coverage areas, however. Signing in to a Wi-Fi network out of your home coverage area should be seamless: You’ll simply use the same credentials as you would on your own cable operator’s network.

As I’ve mentioned in the past, not only will consumers be happy with this broader Wi-Fi coverage, but so too will the mobile broadband network providers: Free Wi-Fi — even from someone else’s hotspot network — helps to offload data from 3G and 4G networks. Single sign-on while roaming on different networks makes this an easy win for consumers while cable providers can use the expanded coverage as a marketing perk to attract new consumers.

Sounds like a win all around to me and to my colleague Stacey, who said this two years ago after speaking to the folks at BelAir Networks, maker of wireless solutions, and now owned by Ericsson:

“So will ISPs take the consumer love of ubiquitous broadband and carriers’ need for offload to the next level and create the equivalent of roaming agreements for Wi-Fi? Greg Williams, the new SVP of corporate development at Bel Air Networks, thinks they might. …He wonders if carriers will negotiate with each other and fixed-line ISPs to get access for their wireless subscribers, especially in congested cities such as New York or San Francisco.”

Two years later, and it looks like the Wi-Fi roaming revolution is well underway. Be sure to bring your smartphone or tablet with you to get on board!

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AT&T’s Wi-Fi experiment: Watch ads, get access

Kevin Fitchard — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 20:48:48 +0000

Remember the old NetZero dial-up Internet plans that gave you free Internet access as long as you put up with an advertising window emblazoned across your screen? Well, AT&T is experimenting with a similar concept at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, only it’s offering up an access technology that these days is in far greater demand: Wi-Fi.

Starting in September, any of DFW’s 57 million annual passengers will be able to access AT&T’s Wi-Fi hotspot network free of change in the airport’s five terminals, but they’ll have to watch a 30-second video ad for every 40 minutes of web surfing they do. Not a bad trade, considering a one-off session at a U.S. airport these days can cost as much as $10.

AT&T hasn’t yet specified whether the free service will be available to smartphones and tablets as well as laptops. An AT&T spokesman said the company is still working on the details. The decision, however, will likely depend on whether those non-PC devices can render the video ads AT&T will proffer.

So far the trial is confined solely to DFW and required special permission from the airport’s board of directors to implement. AT&T made it worth their while: It’s expanding its hotspot coverage and capacity to more areas of the terminals, as well as blanketing parking garages and other parts of the grounds. AT&T is likely assuming it will get a lot of takers for the service, and it’s probably right.

These days, it’s not too hard to find free Wi-Fi in many urban locations, given the number of businesses and residents that open their networks to the world. But airports, conference centers and hotels are major exceptions, and those venues take advantage of their captive audiences by charging exceptional rates. If AT&T expands this pilot to other parts of its 30,000-strong hotspot network, then it could have a game-changing business model on its hands.

AT&T currently sells Wi-Fi access for $20 a month nationwide and offers session-based access for $4 a pop. It’s doubtful AT&T is charging advertisers $4 to show a few 30-second videos, but by making the service free to use, AT&T could also attract a lot more users to its network, giving those advertisers fistfuls of impressions.

There could be a dark side to this little experiment as well. While there’s little downside for the innumerable non-AT&T customers that would otherwise be forced to pay for Wi-Fi access at DFW, AT&T has millions of smartphone and home broadband customers who already get free access to Ma Bell’s hotspots. The AT&T spokesman said AT&T hasn’t yet decided whether that no-strings-attached access for current broadband customers will continue in the confines of DFW.

One of the main reasons AT&T has pursued Wi-Fi is its usefulness as an offload technology, sparing its cellular networks from data overload. This experiment may signify that AT&T is looking for a way to monetize that Wi-Fi traffic.

Airport image courtesy of Flickr user Michal Osmenda

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