However, underlying the statistics are numbers that tell a far different story: in fact, there was a dramaticslowdown in wireless traffic growth during the first half of 2012. Of course, CTIA doesn’t want anyone to realize that, because it is significantly at variance with CTIA’s narrative of an impending “spectrum crunch”into which so much lobbying effort has been invested.

The CTIA press release only quotes total wireless data traffic within the US during the previous 12 months upto June 2012 for a total of 1.16 trillion megabytes, but doesn’t give statistics for data traffic in each individual six-month period. That information, however, can be calculated from previous press releases (whichshow total traffic in the first six months of 2012 was 635 billion MB, compared to 525 billion MB in the final six months of 2011).

Counter to the CTIA’s spin, this represents growth of just 21 percent, a dramatic slowdown from the 54 percent growth in total traffic seen between the first and second half of 2011. Even more remarkably, on a per device basis (based on the CTIA’s total number of smartphones, tablets, laptops and modems, of which 131M were in use at the end of June), the first half of 2012 saw an increase of merely 3 percent in average wireless data traffic per cellphone-network connected device, compared to 29 percent growth between the first and second half of 2011 (and 20-plus percent in prior periods).

Data from Sandvine appears to confirm this slowdown, estimating mean monthly usage per mobile device in North America has fallen by 10 percent since October 2011. To be clear, these figures indicate that device owners have effectively plateaued in their consumption of cell-based data—which seems to fly in the face of conventional wisdom, informed by near constant hype of runaway data consumption by mobile consumers.

What was the cause of this dramatic slowdown in traffic growth? We can’t yet say with complete confidence, but it’s not an extravagant leap of logic to connect it with the widely announced adoption of data caps by the major wireless providers in the spring of 2012. It’s understandable that consumers would become skittish about data consumption and seek out free WiFi alternatives whenever possible. And there’s anecdotal evidence that supports the hypothesis.

For instance, in January the Wall Street Journal first reported on wireless users “shutting off their WiFi option … because constantly searching for a signal can eat up battery life.” But then by March, we were told about new iPad buyers who had started to stream March Madness games in HD only to find out the next day they were “out of gas.” In retrospect both of those stories seem laughable, since offloading traffic to Wi-Fi has become de rigueur for savvy cellular users.

Of course, such changes in behavior may not continue indefinitely, but it seems a fair bet that while caps remain a concern, end users will limit their on-network wireless data usage to a much lower level than is necessary simply to stay within their monthly cap. In addition, as others have noted, the penetration of smartphones is approaching saturation, so we can’t count on growth in the number of devices to pick up the slack.

If continued, the implications of much slower growth in on-net wireless data traffic will be profound. If traffic per device only grows at around 3 percent in the second half of this year, then overall data traffic on cellular network for all of 2012 will be up only about 60 percent on 2011— or about half the widely quoted growth forecast by Cisco. Further, Cisco justifies that number based on the assumption that the “move to tiered pricing does not appear to have an immediate effect on overall mobile data traffic.”In other words, Cisco is making what is essentially an open loop forecast of demand, unconstrained by what customers will be willing and able to afford in the real world.

Those dubious Cisco data points are widely quoted, and especially so by those trying to scare us into thinking that we face a so-called spectrum crunch—a bandwagon that CTIA has all too happily promoted. Even such luminaries as FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski has stated in recent speeches that we are at a crisis point, claiming “U.S. mobile data traffic grew almost 300 percent last year” —while CTIA says it was less than half that, at 123 percent. “There were many skeptics [back in 2009] about whether we faced a spectrum crunch. Today virtually every expert confirms it.”

Perhaps therefore we need to take a step back and think about the motivations of those who are telling us of the need for more licensed spectrum because of a purported looming spectrum crunch. Most obviously, Cisco would certainly like to sell more hardware. Large wireless operators, such as AT&T and Verizon clearly don’t want the FCC to impose caps on their spectrum holdings. Small wireless operators want more spectrum to be made available to lower the cost of network expansion.

Those who have made speculative investments in spectrum want their investors to believe these assets will become more valuable. Even the FCC would like you to believe that their “progress in mobile is driving new waves of job creation and investment.” It seems likely that the emperor really does have no clothes. We’ll have to wait to see whether wireless data traffic in licensed spectrum bands will actually meet or fall short of Cisco’s seemingly over-optimistic projections. And perhaps the leading wireless operators will be forced to soften their data caps by consumer pressure and competition from operators offering unlimited data.

However, given the dominance of Verizon and AT&T, neither seems particularly plausible in the current US wireless market. It seems rather more likely that consumers will adapt to a world of offloading instead, so that wide-area cellular networks will de facto become the backup solution for whenever short range solutions such as Wi-Fi aren’t available.

Even before the recent publicity about data caps, Wi-Fi offload was growing far faster than cellular data traffic, and according to the July 2012 PCAST report, one major carrier now claims to be offloading “more than half of its smartphone traffic onto Wi-Fi.” As the PCAST report also recognizes, low power solutions like Wi-Fi will allow spectrum re-use to increase dramatically, “from 900 to as much as 1.3 million times more than a fixed, large cell-based architecture can provide.”

Then perhaps we will realize, as others have notably pointed out, that “there is no more scarcity of wireless spectrum than there is a shortage of, say, the color purple.”

Tim Farrar is President of Telecom, Media and Finance Associates, a consulting and research firm in Menlo Park, Calif., which specializes in technical and financial analysis across the satellite and telecom sectors. 

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AT&T Senior EVP John Donovan

AT&T is now claiming on its Innovation Space blog that its mobile data traffic is doubling every year, rather than increasing by the more modest 40 percent annual rate it detailed in recent investor and analyst calls. The distinction is important because the faster AT&T’s HSPA and LTE networks become overloaded, the more pressure it faces to use its reserve spectrum and find new sources of airwaves.

AT&T Senior EVP of technology and network operations John Donovan wrote:

But when the year-end numbers show a doubling of wireless data traffic from 2010 to 2011 – and you’ve seen at least a doubling every year since 2007 – the implications are profound.

Over the past five years, AT&T’s wireless data traffic has grown 20,000%.

The growth is now driven primarily by smartphones.  Add to that new customer additions and the continuing trend of upgrades from feature phones to smartphones, and you have a wireless data tsunami.

So is AT&T contradicting itself? No, it’s just looking at different sets of numbers. According to the Wall Street Journal, AT&T confirmed that the 40 percent number cited by AT&T executives cited only factored in increases from existing users, not traffic produced from new subscribers, i.e., the typical AT&T smartphone customer increased his mobile data consumption by 40 percent over the last 12 months. The 100 percent number is for overall mobile data traffic on its network, factoring in the increased usage of its existing subscriber base along with the burden millions of new smartphones brought to its network.

Now AT&T’s numbers make much more sense

Why would AT&T use the 40 percent number, rather than 100 percent number, when it’s trying to convince the public it’s running out of capacity? You have to remember whom AT&T was talking to. Investors and analysts aren’t so much interested in overall traffic increases on AT&T’s network, but in traffic increases AT&T can’t monetize.

The 40 percent increase, in most cases, represents traffic AT&T has to absorb without collecting any incremental revenue. A customer on a 2 GB plan who increases his monthly usage from 1 GB to 1.4 GB doesn’t pay AT&T an additional dime. But a new subscriber represents an entirely new monthly revenue stream. If AT&T’s traffic grows from new subscribers, it has more money with which to add network capacity. That’s not the case with existing customers unless it raises prices (which AT&T basically did).

Despite those huge gains, AT&T’s data traffic is growing at a slower pace than the rest of the U.S. wireless industry. Cisco Systems’ new Visual Networking Index projections, released Tuesday, found that mobile data traffic throughout the U.S. increased by 172 percent in 2011, meaning other operators made up more ground. That probably has a lot to do with AT&T’s early lead in smartphones thanks to its years of iPhone exclusivity. As of the fourth quarter, AT&T had an industry leading 56.8 percent smartphone penetration, which means it has far less headroom than its competitors to grow its traffic through new subscribers.

What’s more, AT&T’s efforts to restrict data usage among its customers seem to be working, reining in its hungriest data users. It introduced throttling on its grandfathered unlimited plans in the fall, which is now kicking in at usage levels as low as 2 GB a month. AT&T has also moved most of its subscriber base over to tiered data plans, which places caps on monthly usage. Consequently, AT&T’s customers are only increasing their consumption by 40 percent each year, compared to the U.S. average of 156 percent annually estimated by Cisco.

iPhone image courtesy of Flickr user mark sebastian

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The problem isn’t congestion, it’s a stagnation.

A study Friday noted that the top one percent of wireless users consume half of all the data. Meanwhile, Public Knowledge on Friday launched a web site designed to help consumers understand their data caps. On Thursday Leap Wireless’ CEO said the company would begin offering data sessions in addition to its regular tiered data plans. Under that scenario a user might buy a data plan just like he would buy pre-paid minutes on an as-needed basis after reaching his cap. All these bits of news are linked by one key problem: wireless data is in high demand, but it’s also expensive to deliver.

And the tension between what consumers want from their wireless networks and what operators want to give them is leading to stories that harp on congestion, new pricing models and consumer advocacy around high-priced plans. But it’s time to stop trying to address that tension solely with new types of rate plans, and customer education. If we want wireless data to become ubiquitous and deliver on the promise of connectivity, the industry needs to address its costs and educate consumers on those costs in a transparent way.

Part of the problem is just a matter of physics — airwaves can only carry so many bits per hertz — but other aspects of the high cost are related to policy and the reluctance of the industry to embrace, or even talk about, technologies that will help them deliver wireless at a lower price per bit. Right now, sending a bit over the cellular airwaves costs a lot more money than it does to send that same bit over fiber or even DSL. How much more depends on if you are in a populated city or out in rural America (it also depends on if you are in America) as well as the type of network the bit is sent over (i.e., LTE, CDMA or HSPA). But broadly speaking it’s at least 200x more expensive to use cell networks according to analyst Chetan Sharma. He estimates that number will drop over time to 100x, but clearly that’s still a huge disparity.

Not all bits are equal (or as expensive). So let’s rethink the network.

Fortunately, not all data has to travel over the gilded cellular pipes. Smart consumers already use Wi-Fi networks for streaming video and movies, but ideally this will become more automated. This means operators must include Wi-Fi in their networks, and actively shunt certain types of traffic to those networks when available. In short, we need application-aware wireless networks that send traffic to the cheapest, but most appropriate network the application can use and the consumer will accept.

This means when I stream YouTube videos, my carrier routes me over to Wi-Fi if it’s available but my email and voice calls stay on 3G if the Wi-Fi is weak. As a consumer I would advocate Wi-Fi as the default network with carriers switching me over to a cellular plan only when absolutely necessary, much like upstart Republic Wireless tries to do. Buying cell phone plans becomes a little more complicated, perhaps involving a short questionnaire that a consumer fills out ranking what types of traffic he needs to get instantaneously versus the traffic he is willing to compromise on.

This new type of plan also means that consumers may have to accept lower quality service for streaming video, might end up paying for access to a carrier Wi-Fi network and will need to accept their operators monitoring the applications they use. There’s a role for developers here in building tools that help consumers see exactly what their operators are doing, and the FCC should stay active in enforcing the spirit of the network neutrality rules. I have a hard time believing that carriers could behave well enough for me to trust them with something like this — just look at their historical stances on Wi-Fi, or the recent questions around Google’s Wallet service on Verizon’s network, but something has to give and I don’t think it will be the operators.

We want what we want. Until we have to pay for it.

CTIA says ladies like their mobile data.

Despite the cost of wireless plans, we want and will use wireless data. On Friday, the CTIA put out a study noting how women use the wireless network for an increasing amount of stuff. And articles offering a word of caution about viewing the Superbowl on your mobile phone get that while it may make you bust through your data cap, people will watch bits of a big game on the go. That very idea was unthinkable a few years ago, but mobile has changed our surfing, shopping and even our TV watching habits.

Carriers have moved forward in delivering faster networks that can deliver between 5 and 12 Mbps down — enough for video, voice and even the most demanding web services — but their current cost models don’t match up with the usage expected and advertised on the networks they’re building. Consumers look at carriers’ pricing, their marketing (which shows customers streaming video on their phones) and their comments in the press about high costs for mobile data and congestion, and recognize that carriers are not telling the whole truth. If network resources are such a precious commodity, then why not price data so it costs more at peak times? Or why even encourage video on the LTE network?

But when will that disconnect between the ease of using a service and the high cost of that service start to change or curtail consumer behavior? In short, when will a user suddenly think, “Maybe I shouldn’t use my phone for this, right now?” In a mobile-first world, will wireless become a second-class access technology, or will carriers adapt their networks and their cost structures in time?

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But how much more can its sales grow now that Internet sharing functionality has become a common staple in smartphones and even other connected devices? The MiFi may become a relic, albeit an important one that helped bridge a time when cellular connections weren’t as ubiqutious and connectivity wasn’t taken for granted.

Regardless, the milestone of 3 million sales is a sizable accomplishment from the mobile broadband equipment maker. And I’m not surprised, because I remember being impressed by my first look at the thin, credit-card sized device at the early 2009 CTIA trade show. It only took a few minutes to convince me that Novatel Wireless was on to something with the MiFi’s simplicity and utility: Press a button and the MiFi instantly creates a personal Wi-Fi hotspot that shares a 3G or 4G data connection.

My MiFi

I bought my own MiFi last year and have used it during travel and as a backup connection at home for when either the power or home broadband connection goes out. With the ability to connect to five Wi-Fi devices — some models can support eight devices — the MiFi has made many long car rides far less boring. Our kids connect iPads, small tablets and laptops to the mobile web for hours at a time while on the road.

Will consumers continue to follow suit and keep buying the MiFi devices, however? Although we used our MiFi quite a bit when we first bought it, our usage has dwindled considerably; some months we don’t use it at all and I’m now considering the idea of canceling our $35 month-to-month deal. Our desire to be connected while mobile hasn’t diminished — if anything, it has increased — so what changed?

Software for the win

In May of last year, my Android handset gained the same functionality as the MiFi, and my Samsung Galaxy Tab has it too. Using software in these devices, I can share a 3G connection with several Wi-Fi devices, eliminating the need to carry a MiFi at all. Because my plan allows for it, there’s no charge for this ability, although the plan is old and newer plans typically add $20 or more per month to enable this feature.

I’ve kept the MiFi since then for two reasons, and I suspect they’re the same reasons that some people will opt for a dedicated mobile hotspot instead of using their phone. For one, the hotspot feature can quickly drain a smartphone’s battery. I carry a spare battery at all times for my Android phone, but I’m likely in the minority. Using up a phone battery for MiFi-like features ends up leaving you with no Mi-Fi and no smartphone, i.e.: a useless brick. My other reason is because the MiFi is on a different network than my smartphone, which gives me some redundancy if one of the two is down.

So while there’s good reason for some to buy and use a MiFi, however, I recall some other reasons that sounded good at the time, but really haven’t come to pass. A number of times since the product’s introduction, Novatel Wireless has touted the ability of the MiFi to run unique software solutions. One example is having the device pull all of your email just before getting on a plane and then reading that mail offline after a data transfer from MiFi to laptop, for example. Ideas such as that sound good and could help add more value to the MiFi, but for now, the device is primarily known for a simple way to get online with tablets and laptops as needed.

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This Wi-Fi adoption is good for both the carriers and the Wi-Fi industry, of which Devicescape is a part. The San Bruno, Calif., company creates software that helps devices connect seamlessly to Wi-Fi networks and surveys its customers every three months for the wireless report. Some additional highlights from this quarter’s data include:

• Of those who use Wi-Fi outside their home or office, most (24.4 percent) connect at a café or coffee shop, 17.3 percent at a hotel and 15 percent at a school campus.
• Data capping continues to play a role in consumer satisfaction this quarter, with 72.9 percent of respondents presuming they will switch carriers if faced with data capping.
• A full 80 percent will likely adjust their downloading habits if data capping is introduced by their carrier.
• Wi-Fi is still considered a necessary feature, with 82 percent of respondents expecting it to be included in their overall data plan.

The last point may be of more interest to network operators, who are increasingly looking for ways to combat data demand that’s rising fast. Earlier this year, Cisco said it expected the average mobile user to consume 1,185 MB of data per month by 2015. That’s far more than the 250 MB that AT&T  claimed was used by 65 percent of its customers when the carrier switched from unlimited to tiered mobile broadband plans. In light of this demand growth, network operators are looking to offload data users onto Wi-Fi networks, in addition to using other demand-reduction strategies.

With nearly three-quarters of the 1,227 Devicescape survey respondents saying they’ll leave their carrier if faced with data caps, I’m wondering who they’ll turn to. Following AT&T’s move to plans with limited amounts of data last June, Verizon has suggested it will do the same this summer. And due to AT&T’s proposed purchase of T-Mobile, the number four carrier, AT&T and Verizon will account for nearly 80 percent of all cellular customers in the U.S., all of whom are likely to have limited mobile broadband plans.

Instead of leaving the major carriers, it’s more likely that most mobile subscribers will keep their contracts and simply find more hot spots. Even with a relatively small surcharge for Wi-Fi, consumers want to keep the data flowing on their smartphones and tablets. We’ll see if the subscriber numbers change after Verizon modifies its plans, but one thing is certain: Wi-Fi has surely migrated from a lowly home network connection and has become a major go-to solution on the road for many data users.

Image courtesy of Flickr user fboyd

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Boingo operates a global Wi-Fi network with more than 325,000 hotspots in more than 100 countries. According to its amended S-1, the company increased revenue from $56.7 million in 2008 to $65.7 million in 2009, a 16-percent increase. Revenue in 2010 grew by 22 percent to $80.4 million with adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, growing from $13.5 million in 2009 to $18.2 million last year, a 35-percent increase. The Los Angeles company, which plans to list on the Nasdaq under the symbol WIFI, is offering 5.8 million shares at a price range of $12 to $14. Renaissance Capital said at the midpoint of the proposed range, Boingo will command a market value of $486 million

While Boingo’s financial outlook is solid (though not scintillating), the company is banking on riding the increased demand for wireless broadband. It cited Cisco’s  visual networking index, which forecasts mobile data consumption is expected to increase 26 times by 2015. The goal is for Boingo to help carriers offload their data needs on to Boingo’s network, helping them stay ahead of the crushing demand for wireless broadband. Even with the rollout of 4G services, Boingo is a good position to participate in the growing consumer appetite for wireless connectivity. The company believes its scalable and global network will provide a reliable way in which to increase capacity for operators.

Carrier offload will have to be a critical piece of Boingo’s success because its consumer business is pretty modest. It had 200,000 subscribers at the end of last year, though that number fell to 158,000 hit 214,000 by March 2011. The company has a churn rate of 9.2 percent.  That’s a lot of customers it needs to replace each quarter. Boingo also faces risks in negotiating with existing and new venue partners, where it seeks to install its networks. And discussions with carriers can be lengthy and unpredictable, Boingo said in its S-1, which can also cause uncertainty. Not to mention the fact that Wi-Fi is becoming free at more locations like Starbucks and McDonald’s.

Boingo will need to show that it can strike good deals with carriers and be a strong partner for them when it comes to handling their growing data needs. This is a serious concern for operators, so Boingo has a good chance to capitalize if it can execute on its game plan.

The Boingo IPO also highlights the resurgence of public offerings. According to the National Venture Capital Association, 14 venture-backed companies went public in the first quarter of 2011, raising $1.4 billion. That was the highest number to go public in a quarter since 2007. Chinese social network Renren and mobile security provider NetQin are among a handful of other companies preparing to go public this week. With Pandora, LinkedIn and Kayak also preparing for IPOs, this year is shaping up to be a big one for tech companies looking to go public.

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The Seven Open Channel technology monitors data requests from mobile apps and only sends traffic when new information is available. Basically, it limits the amount of times the device’s radio has to turn on. By eliminating unnecessary requests, Seven can help devices reduce their time on a network by up to 40 percent, according to early tests. And it helps reduce mobile traffic by up to 70 percent while boosting battery life by up to 25 percent.

The key is in tapping Seven’s existing work in push email. The company began building an efficient way to sync emails to the cloud in 2000. But with app use booming, and apps increasingly connected to the cloud, it made sense to leverage Seven’s work in email.

“Open Channel does for the Mobile Internet what content delivery networks did for the wired network – work with the existing infrastructure to provide scalability to handle massive data loads,” said Ross Bott, president and CEO of SEVEN. “This is an exciting new business direction for SEVEN Networks, one that leverages our technology expertise, but that also takes us into an exploding new market.”

Seven said the technology is compatible with Android handsets initially and is in trials with tier-1 carriers in the U.S. and Europe. The technology includes device software that works with a server to manage traffic. Seven said the software augments existing traffic optimization tools such as fast dormancy and doesn’t require any changes for the network. Open Channel is also transparent to developers and shouldn’t change the experience for mobile users, Seven said.

We’ve been talking about the growing data demands of mobile devices and their impact on wireless networks. Cisco predicted last year that mobile users will consume 3.6 exabytes a month on wireless networks worldwide by 2014. As Om recently wrote, we’re on our way toward the gigabyte phone, in which the average user consumes a gigabyte of data a month. This probably won’t slow the migration toward metered pricing by carriers, but it’s an additional tool for mobile operators to stay ahead of the crush of mobile traffic coming. With data demand only expected to skyrocket, any bit can help.

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This is really about operators being upset over the Googles and Apples of the world profiting off the pipes the operators have built. Instead of realizing they are about providing access or building awesome content of their own, they sit at the table begging for a chunk of profits from companies which have built something on top of the operator’s networks. When begging doesn’t work, they threaten to stifle access and innovation. The carriers are like old dogs that can’t learn a new trick. Unfortunately, right now, the only trick they have is peeing on your rug.

Ed Whitacre, AT&T’s former CEO, tried to play this card a number of years ago on the wireline side, pushing for content providers to pay a quality of service tariff. The plan didn’t go through, but it showed some of the vacuous thinking of operators. That wireless carriers in Europe are looking at flogging the same idea shows they’re either dumb or really bold. Either way, it smacks of desperation.

What the carriers don’t understand is that they provide access. Yes, mobile data usage is soaring but that’s the business the carriers are in. They rely on Google and others to get people to buy their data plans and their phones. Without great services, why would people want to pony up for a smartphone or a data plan? It was great just a couple of years ago when data revenue helped offset declining margins on voice. But now that data is exploding, it’s put the carriers in a tough position.

However, trying to get money from content providers is not the way to go. The carriers are already charging users for data, and are in the midst of changing their pricing plans to reflect the very real flood of traffic caused by user demand. Right now, their wireless businesses are still very profitable; for example, Verizon reported operating income on its wireless business of 29.9 percent. It’s preferable that the operators look at tweaking that model to manage traffic and revenue. We’ve advocated innovative pricing for data plans and dynamic pricing, which makes more sense in a world with limited bandwidth and spectrum. They shouldn’t try to build a double-sided market by dipping into the revenue of companies, who have legitimately created valuable services on top of their networks. A flour mill owner can’t approach the baker for a cut of his bread revenue. This would stifle innovation and potentially undermine the dynamism in the mobile world. Will popular app makers have to worry about paying as well if their apps are consuming bandwidth?

If the wireless operators are peeved at Google and others making money off their pipes — and they are no doubt mad — they should build their own services that appeal to users. Otherwise, the carriers shouldn’t argue that they’re more than dumb pipes. The carriers may think they’re getting out early on charging content providers and may have more leverage than their wired counterparts. But pushing an unpopular model again doesn’t reflect bold thinking; it really shows that the idea cupboard is bare. Let’s hope their American wireless counterparts don’t try the same trick here.

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Post and thumbnail photos courtesy of Flickr user abbynormy

In less than a decade, we’ve seen three distinct mobile eras, says Gartner: a past one of devices, the current multi-million dollar app economy era and soon, a service and social era powered by location and connectivity. Helping to take the world into the service era are robust platforms, such as HTML5, that will provide feature-rich web apps to rock our worlds. Linking such apps with context will provide a more personalized mobile experience.

Gartner anaylst Nik Jones notes the importance that location will bring to mobility:

Context will also be a key criteria for the selection of partners. Many mobile business systems will exploit contextual cloud services hosted by others. It will also be a major commercial battleground with powerful vendors such as Nokia, Google, and Apple striving to own the consumer’s context. Context will also be bound up with social relationships and social networks, illustrated today by services such as location-tagged posts to Facebook and Twitter.

As much as wireless broadband has primarily enabled mobile lifestyles to date, the importance of user context is appearing more and more in my conversations with industry sources. Today we’re seeing the simple benefits of location: finding friends or places of importance nearby or ads we may want to see in specific geo-fenced areas, for example. Context and location could drive user interfaces of future mobile devices, build maps of activities we’ve done, and will surely play a big role in augmented reality applications.

Put another way: Maps already provide an interface that’s intuitively understandable by most people on the planet. If such an interface is paired with connectivity and services in the future, context itself could be a bigger driver of mobility than plain old wireless broadband. Broadband connects us to the cloud, but linking our location to the cloud opens up a new world of possibilities.

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