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Wi-Fi
Providers
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Wi-Fi
Recommended
Sony
Notebooks
Dell Handheld
Fujitsu
Notebook
  
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Wi-Fi
Hot Spots |
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Many companies have begun setting up
Wi-Fi access points or hot spots at their business to
give them a competitive advantage over their competitors.
The cost to set a business up as a Hot Spot has come down
in recent years removing barriers to entry and allowing
the business owners the opportunity for new revenue
streams. The revenue while not there yet will come from
end users paying for access to the internet at the hot
spot location.
Many new companies are involved in the build-out of these
hot spots including Bell, SpotNik, Fatport, and V-Link
Inc. There are also large telecom carriers getting
involved including Cantel-AT&T, Telus and Rogers. In the
US a company under the name of Cometa is poised to build
20,000 new hot spots with the help of Intel, IBM and
AT&T. The growth of hot spots is sure to expand rapidly
since there are little to no barriers to entry for the
operators. In comparison the cellular industry uses part
of the spectrum that requires a costly government license
to operate under. In fact, the Telco’s in Europe paid
over $100 billion dollars for the 3G license and have
seen little or no return on that investment as of yet.
Another benefit of Wi-Fi is the fact that so many
hardware distributors are enabling their devices with
Wi-Fi radios instead of a proprietary technology. This
means the competition will be fierce and that consumers
can purchase from a large number of suppliers resulting
in low barriers to entry for the end user. End users are
able to connect to a network with a PDA or laptop at home
and on the road with a Wi-Fi compliant device.
Currently Wi-Fi operates at 11Mbps under the 80211.b
standard which is over 100 times faster than a dial up
modem connection. Wi-Fi is also much faster than the 2.5G
wireless services provided by cellular carriers, which
typically deliver throughput between 40Kbps and 60Kbps.
The bottle neck with speeds will not be the wireless
connection but the connection the Hot Spot has with the
internet. Most DSL connections operate at 400Kbps, ADSL
at 7.1 Mbps and T1 lines at operate in the 1.5 Mbps to 10
Mbps range.
There is a tremendous opportunity for small business
owners to get involved in this new and exciting industry
with a great risk reward ratio. While it may take a
couple of years for revenues to materialize the cost of
set up are low enough to make this a no brainer. In
addition, as companies like Starbucks and McDonalds enter
the market.
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