USURF America (FAQ), supplys voice and high-speed internet access to apartments using Wi-Fi backbones.
The 240 unit, Green Valley Apartments in eastern Colorado Springs, is fully operational. Another development near downtown Denver, with 225 dwelling units will get video and data services in the summer of 2003 via Wi-Fi. The company has an exclusive 15-year contract to provide communication services to a mix of 376 condos and single-family homes in the Denver area.
Usurf’s Quick-Cell(TM) equipment, has Voice over IP (VOIP) capability, using Wi-Fi 802.11 standards on the unlicensed 2.4 and 5.8GHz spectrum. The small Quick-Cell server modems cover approximately 7 square miles and can handle about 125 wireless DSL (256 Kbps) customers. When that server modem nears capacity, they deploy another identical, integrated server modem for about $3,000. The combination of “smart” antenna technology from Wireless Online (the PointBeam 2400), and Usurf’s Quick-Cell system expands the capacity of the network “as much as eight times.” USURF America says that no telephone or other wall jack connection is necessary to connect to the Internet over the so-called last mile.
USURF offers a variety of high-speed fixed-wireless IP packages, starting at 256Kbps at $49/month. SOHO/business packages start at $99/month for 512Kbps with speeds available up to 6 Mbps.
Oneder.net, a wireless ISP in Maryland, targets retirement homes. The rooftop antenna links to their network hub in Baltimore. At $29.99 a month, it’s cheaper than Comcast’s $45 monthly cable-modem service.
Yacht Clubs in San Francisco in Seattle, Portland and other places may be another specialized and underserved market. Steve Robert’s Microship is an extension of his ground-breaking Behemoth recumbant bike which carried him over 10,000 miles across the United States - the first technomad.
Portland’s College Housing Northwest owns and manages dozens of apartment buildings around Portland. I live in one of them. An Orinoco 2500 AP on each floor might provide $20/month broadband, and benefit everyone.
“Last mile” unlicensed backbones that are competitive with DSL or cable modems is the dream. Promising technologies include Etherlinx (Glenn Fleishman has a Q&A), Vivato (which uses “smart” antennas and ordinary 802.11), and Mesh Networking (which routes signals through ajoining units).
SONbuddy from Green Packets, is an intelligent software platform designed to enable any WiFi-equipped devices (802.11b/g/a) to form a spontaneous Self Organizing Network (SON) using Mesh. SONbuddy automatically seeks, organizes and maintains a peer-to-peer and peer-to-multipeer ad-hoc community network based on user defined preferred parameters. The mesh multi-hop capabilities enable a wider area to be covered than traditional single-node networking and uses IPsec. Green Packet’s software is based on UMTS standards for Mobile IP, which enable heterogeneous roaming (Wi-Fi to cellular handoff). Intel’s PROSet software will enable Banias users to move seamlessly from a wired connection to a Wi-Fi connection without having to shut down.
In-Stat/MDR estimates, the licensed-exempt service for fixed wireless in the U.S. will grow three-fold in 2002, and by 2006 over two-thirds of all wireless broadband subscriptions will be on a licensed-exempt system. Residential subscriptions to fixed wireless broadband in the U.S. is estimated to grow from approximately 338,000 at the end of 2001 to 3.1 million by the end of 2006.
