NEW ORLEANS–The second day of keynote speeches at this year’s Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association show in New Orleans had a similar theme to last year’s event with wireless local area network technology dominating much of the conversation as well as repeat appearances by a pair of industry executives.
Following opening remarks from CTIA president Tom Wheeler and a brief wireless fashion show, Sky Dayton, founder and chief executive officer of public Wi-Fi aggregator Boingo Inc., made a return appearance to the CTIA stage poviding insight into what he thought was necessary to increase consumer interest in public Wi-Fi services as well as an update on the continued expansion of Boingo’s operations.
Dayton explained that similar to the cellular industry’s early days, public Wi-Fi adoption will begin to increase once there are roaming agreements in place that allow customers to access any Wi-Fi network regardless of which company is providing that access.
“It’s where we are going as an industry,” Dayton said of Wi-Fi roaming. Dayton also talked about a deal Boingo signed with public Wi-Fi leader T-Mobile USA Inc. to develop end-user software and services designed to make it easier for Wi-Fi customers to access T-Mobile’s HotSpot service as well as its GPRS data network.
Supporting Dayton’s view on the viability of public Wi-Fi networks, Toshiba vice president of business development John Marshton conveyed the technology company’s plans for its recent network announcement with consulting firm Accenture.
A main point of Toshiba’s plans involved rolling out its Wi-Fi network infrastructure using less expensive components in an attempt to provide a quicker return on investment for hot spot installations. Those cost saving measures include competitively priced ready-to-install Wi-Fi access point equipment and the use of digital subscriber lines instead of more expensive T-1 connections.
“If you spend a lot of money on a hot spots you don’t make any money,” Marshton said.
While wireless carriers continue to throw their hats into the Wi-Fi arena, evidenced by the announcements made during the conference, Qualcomm Inc.’s Irwin Jacobs said he was not convinced of the need nor financial viability of such public Wi-Fi networks.
To no one’s surprise Jacobs explained that Qualcomm’s cdma2000 1x EV-DO technology, which Verizon Wireless was demonstrating at the show in support of its limited commercial launch in San Diego and Washington, D.C., said the high-speed data technology provided adequate speeds for most applications more cst effectively that Wi-Fi due to 1x EV-DO’s ability to serve a broader coverage area.
“Wide area coverage will be the way to go,” Jacobs said. “Economics is the name of the game.”
Wi-Fi was also part of a roundtable discussion that included chief executives from four of the nations top seven wireless operators and also rounded out the second day’s keynote schedule.
Members of the discussion included Nextel Communications Inc.’s Tim Donahue, Alltel Corp.’s Scott Ford, T-Mobile USA’s John Stanton and Sprint PCS’ Len Lauer.
All supported Dayton’s view that Wi-Fi roaming would be important to grow the public Wi-Fi business, though Donahue noted that with so many companies getting involved in deploying Wi-Fi networks, those agreements could prove difficult to attain.
“It’s a bit like herding cats,” Donahue professed.
The operators also differed on how to best integrate Wi-Fi with their cellular-based services.
Stanton’s approach was obviously the most aggressive as T-Mobile USA is in the process of turning on more than 2,000 public Wi-Fi locations since it acquired bankrupt public Wi-Fi provider MobileStar in late 2001 and Stanton announced the carrier’s Wi-Fi intentions at last year’s CTIA show in Orlando.
“We are embracing [Wi-Fi] as an opportunity,” Stanton explained.
Lauer said Sprint PCS, which is an investor in Boingo, was looking at the technology as a way to bolster in-building coverage, while both Donahue and Ford had a more conservative approach to the market.
“It’s not ready for primetime for our customer base,” Donahue said.
Despite his trepidation on the deployment of Wi-Fi services, Donahue did remark that the wireless industry would end up surprising many pundits this year who feel industry growth has stalled.
“I think the industry is going to have a much better year than people think,” Donahue said.
