Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
The big thing here is... Is one selling revenue or selling a network? If one is selling revenue, the buyer could probably care less what allows the revenue to happen. But personally, I Don;t want to jsut sell revenue, I want to get credit for my infrastructure also. If a network is installed right, with the right gear, it should be worth MORE than the cost to buy the gear new uninstalled, NOT LESS as used gear. I'd argue Alvarion type gear could maximize the value allocated for the infrastructure. It also depends on whetehr someone is trying to get 1X annual versus 6 x annnual. To get the high Xs, you need more than just revenue to sell. The flip view, is if the flexibilty of selling the Mikrotik can gain you revenue quicker (which would need debating), then it could be argued as an advantage to have higher rate of revenue growth than infrastructure credit.. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Patrick Leary [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 1:00 AM Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients I appreciate the honest criticism, really, but the situation about your network being at an equity disadvantage is very real. You CAN sell it, but you won't find many eager buyers and you won't get a good price. An Alvarion network does bring a higher value. I'm sure Moto networks may fetch an okay price (not as high as an Alvarion network). But, and this is the reality, an 802.11b network has a much lower equity value. An 802.11 network using illegal gear will have an even worse value. That's just reality and I will try to get validation from one or two of the roll-up guys I know and I'll ask if I can quote him. ...(I've placed him in the bcc, hopefully he is around this weekend to extend his opinion.) Regards, Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Rick Smith Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 9:19 PM To: 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients Why can't I sell what I've built ?Because it doesn't brag on the Alvarion name ? Please. As for growth path, I've got rooftop leases for these repeaters. They're legally guaranteed for 30 yrs in most cases. Sheesh, in some cases, the houses will fall down before the equipment dies. I noticed that you pointed out the CX-BA-2.4-900 stuff. That's all fine and good. Oranges to Oranges, its WA more expensive to use Alvarion, and by $1000's. CX 2.4/900 repeater is like $2,000 or more. Same functionality with Mikrotik and Ubiquiti is around $500. So, the way I see it, I can put 4 repeaters up, and cover 4 times the area that I can with one CX repeater. AND, my tower side cost me $2,000 less as well! So, $5,000 spent = 1 customer and repeater with tower side on Alvarion, or 9 customers with repeaters and tower side with Mikrotik / Ubiquiti, AND I've got 9 repeaters out there touching a ton more customers. With Mikrotik, I've got firewalling / vpn / qos / bandwidth metering / HOTSPOT / OSPF / WDS / and a routed network all the way to each customer, OR a bridged network if I should so choose. Why would I have any less a path for growth or satisfactory exit in putting together Mikrotik solutions as opposed to Alvarion ? Cost of implementation's cheaper. Cost of replacement's cheaper. Cost of value added services are cheaper, AND implemented with only a phone call from the customer or even a hotspot implementation. Future bandwidth's just there - no manufacturer throttling to pay to upgrade like Alvarion Mikrotik doesn't tell me what I can't do - they put it all there and let you decide. No unlock extortion. Actually, I just sold a chunk of my Pennsylvania network, that was still in a build-up phase, with tower sites installed and a couple customers, for some cash that's going to run the rest of my network for a while. Whole thing was built on Canopy and Mikrotik tower sides and cpe's. Ya know, there IS one product I'll use religiously from Alvarion and it's the 2.4 DS11 backhaul units. Rock solid, decently priced (on the used market) and it's truly install-and-forget-it's-there stuff. I just don't see the financial advantage to spending anything else on Alvarion gear though. Especially when I've got high speed backhauls, short and long distance backhauls, multiple frequency ranges, including licensed and public safety, LOS, NLOS and hotspot / billing / etc all built into one platform that doesn't cost a ton of money, and there's a lot of good support for. I don't see how that's bad business. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Patrick Leary Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 10:54 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
I agree than name brand gear, is a safer bet for a WISP, which is why I primarilly use Name brand certified gear. However your been there done that areguement for 802.11B does not apply. There is a BIG difference between todays flexible 802.11a gear and last generation legacy 802.11b. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Gino A. Villarini [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 8:22 AM Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients I second Patrick comments, As a growing wisp and looking to acquisition opportunities, the only way I would buy a 802.11 based wisp was in the premise of tearing that equipment out and putting some Canopy in place... for others it could be Trango or Alvarion. 802.11 gear is good for starting out, but it doesn't scale ... been there, done that. Replaced 100's of 11b gear with Canopy, never looked back. Let me say more, that was the turning point of growth on my company.. Gino A. Villarini [EMAIL PROTECTED] Aeronet Wireless Broadband Corp. tel 787.273.4143 fax 787.273.4145 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Patrick Leary Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 3:15 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients No, at the moment just anecdotal. Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dylan Oliver Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 10:41 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On 12/2/06, Patrick Leary [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I appreciate the honest criticism, really, but the situation about your network being at an equity disadvantage is very real. You CAN sell it, but you won't find many eager buyers and you won't get a good price. An Alvarion network does bring a higher value. I'm sure Moto networks may fetch an okay price (not as high as an Alvarion network). But, and this is the reality, an 802.11b network has a much lower equity value. An 802.11 network using illegal gear will have an even worse value. That's just reality and I will try to get validation from one or two of the roll-up guys I know and I'll ask if I can quote him. ...(I've placed him in the bcc, hopefully he is around this weekend to extend his opinion.) Hi Patrick, What basis do you have for the claim that an Alvarion network will fetch a higher price than a Canopy network? Some analysis of historical sell prices? I'd be interested to see it. Best, -- Dylan Oliver Primaverity, LLC -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses(190). This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses(42). This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
I always get jealous when I hear the stories where people can pull off using Omni's in 900. In our neck of the woods it is IMPOSSIBLE to get 360 degree of free spectrum on the same channel. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Rick Smith [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 10:02 AM Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients using SR9's, with small cells - 1 - 2 milers. I have towers fed with 5 gig Tik, and there's generally 20 meg available at any tower. We're pulling 5 gig connections down to a vantage point or two, then using an SR9 with an omni from there to feed SR9 CPEs that have SR2 APs inside -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of John Scrivner Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 9:41 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients How can you do 5 meg per client on 900 MHz? You would have to have several times that speed available per sector. Are you using the whole 900 MHz band on one sector? If yes then how do you stop self-interference on adjacent sectors? Scriv Rick Smith wrote: I thought about the same things. Once I put canopy or trango in, I've gotta replace the whole damn radio once cable / dsl starts taking away my customers. I'm in a cable / dsl area, and taking customers away from them, and basing it on Mikrotik. We're faster, not cheaper, and definitely better. But without being able to push 5 meg to the customer, I couldn't offer those plans. Doing that with anything but Mikrotik or PERHAPS tranzeo is costly or impossible, in this area due to 900 mhz needs and no clear 5.8 range. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Gino A. Villarini Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 8:22 AM To: 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients I second Patrick comments, As a growing wisp and looking to acquisition opportunities, the only way I would buy a 802.11 based wisp was in the premise of tearing that equipment out and putting some Canopy in place... for others it could be Trango or Alvarion. 802.11 gear is good for starting out, but it doesn't scale ... been there, done that. Replaced 100's of 11b gear with Canopy, never looked back. Let me say more, that was the turning point of growth on my company.. Gino A. Villarini [EMAIL PROTECTED] Aeronet Wireless Broadband Corp. tel 787.273.4143 fax 787.273.4145 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Patrick Leary Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 3:15 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients No, at the moment just anecdotal. Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dylan Oliver Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 10:41 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On 12/2/06, Patrick Leary [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I appreciate the honest criticism, really, but the situation about your network being at an equity disadvantage is very real. You CAN sell it, but you won't find many eager buyers and you won't get a good price. An Alvarion network does bring a higher value. I'm sure Moto networks may fetch an okay price (not as high as an Alvarion network). But, and this is the reality, an 802.11b network has a much lower equity value. An 802.11 network using illegal gear will have an even worse value. That's just reality and I will try to get validation from one or two of the roll-up guys I know and I'll ask if I can quote him. ...(I've placed him in the bcc, hopefully he is around this weekend to extend his opinion.) Hi Patrick, What basis do you have for the claim that an Alvarion network will fetch a higher price than a Canopy network? Some analysis of historical sell prices? I'd be interested to see it. Best, -- Dylan Oliver Primaverity, LLC -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ *** * This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses(190). *** * *** * This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses(42).
Re: [WISPA] Alvarion vs Moto/802.11 network value
Somethings don't need proof, to be known to be true. I also don't feel there are many real world evaluations that give credability to what a valuation can end up being based on equipment. There are to many factors in a sale, to know exactly why the price was or wasn't gotten. My proof is just my own common sense, learned from communication with prospective buyers. I've NEVER heard a response Oh you have Alvarion, not sure I want to give you credit for that crap. It just doesn't happen. I don't even think the buyers understand the difference in the various gear. But it can never hurt you to a product that someone almost definately has heard of, and recognize as a name brand product. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Patrick Leary [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 11:57 AM Subject: RE: [WISPA] Alvarion vs Moto/802.11 network value From my understanding, prices have varied significantly (not a surprise right) and depends on many things like demographics covered, quality of the network including physical infrastructure (e.g. mounting assets), hardware infrastructure, NOC facilities, quality of contracts in place (e.g. site/tower contracts), and of course subscriber counts and types. During this upcoming work week, I'll see if some of the people involved in valuations would be willing to share some information. Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dylan Oliver Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 7:14 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Alvarion vs Moto/802.11 network value On 12/2/06, Patrick Leary [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: No, at the moment just anecdotal. So what how much more do Alvarion networks anecdotally go for? How was this broken down - in terms of $$$/subscriber? Best, -- Dylan Oliver Primaverity, LLC -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses(190). This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses(43). This footnote confirms that this email message has been scanned by PineApp Mail-SeCure for the presence of malicious code, vandals computer viruses. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
The real significant value will come when AP bandwdith management will allow bandwdith management on individual VLAN tags. Meaning, if 10 customers reside behind 1 CPE, 10 seperate bandwidth management assignments can be made for them. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 2:51 PM Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On Sat, 2 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: Yeah, the waters in the routed vs. bridged argument are getting more and more muddied all of the time. How many wasted ip's are there in a routed network? Lots. This is a big misconception. I don't have time to go into it here, but the truth of the matter is that what you are calling wasted is better described as a cost in exchange for a benefit. What are the benefits of a routed network? More control and better customer isolation. This is only one of the benefits. Scalability especially in a wireless network is a benefit. Alvarion offering VLAN will provide some of the scalability and other benefits that routing will offer. If you think that VLANs are a scalable solution, look over the networks owned by the tier 1 providers and see what they are using...routed with BGP. With the new ap's that block client to client isolation, with vlan switches, bandwidth controlling cpe (or other solutions) and features like what Patrick is talking about routing is becoming less and less critical every day. No...it's becoming less and less used toward the customer because more and more people are getting into the business of providing internet service without understanding HOW or WHY their network would function better if it were not bridged. You can argue that point if you want, but I have moved more networks from bridged to routed with positive results than the other way around. (there is one notable exception, but I think those results are a bit skewed for other reasons.) Is bridging easier? Yes. Is it common? Among smaller providers, yes. Is is scalable? Only if you use some other technology (such as vlan) to create the separation between the endpoints. As I said, even with VLANs, there is a limit to the scale the network can reach without some routing. solution. They vlan customers into a single port to the isp. Basically frame a fancy switch, almost frame relay. No routing used at all. We don't even have a good option for routing at the You don't think their networks are routed? Look at your border router...the public interface is going to have a /30 address...your range of public IP space is routed via that /30 address. You are incorrect in your assumption that there is no routing used at all. customer other than doing it just because. It's certainly not a requirement. No...not a requirement. It's just a more scalable solution. Maybe if you are a HUGE isp but certainly not for a few hundreds subs. Hundreds of subs it's still a maybe. And with thousands I'd disagree here, too. But, I've only been an ISP since 1993, so what do I know... The technology included in the VL line makes it easier to build a network that can be run by less technical staff. There is a cost savings there too. It is true that the VL line of products offer some real options. VLANs are a GOOD tool, and having this option DOES offer some cool upsale possibilities. But, VLANs are not intended to be a replacement for a routed network. I've been in this business for a long time. I've built several networks to fairly large scale, including more than one to over 1000 customer base. One that I am now managing has over 3000 subs. That network is using VLANs to provide some services. It is using other technologies as well, but the network is routed. You can't scale a bridged network. It's just that simple. As I said in another post...you don't have to believe that, others don't have to do it, but it IS the best practice. -- Butch Evans Network Engineering and Security Consulting 573-276-2879 http://www.butchevans.com/ Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
[WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
Tom DeReggi wrote: The big thing here is... Is one selling revenue or selling a network? Both. No way around it. If one is selling revenue, the buyer could probably care less what allows the revenue to happen. I have been looking at other WISPs around me for possible merge / acquisition and I do care. I am a potential buyer of WISPs. I understand the costs related to forklift upgrades or high costs related to OPEX of a network if things are not done the way they need to be done. It most certainly matters to me. But personally, I Don;t want to jsut sell revenue, I want to get credit for my infrastructure also. If a network is installed right, with the right gear, it should be worth MORE than the cost to buy the gear new uninstalled, NOT LESS as used gear. Exactly. Understand this though also. If I am buying a WISP and he has depreciated all the gear before I bought his corporation then I am a fool to value his gear higher (zero tax deduction for equipment depreciation). Please do not think this means that fast depreciation is a bad thing. It most certainly is not. Good infrastructure could make or break a deal though too. I would never pay a good price for a network I did not think was already built solid and reliable. Why bother? I could always over-build my own network if I thought the existing network was bad. It is harsh truth and we all know it happens. None of us own the spectrum we operate on. Build it right and others would go broke trying to overbuild you (we hope). Build it like crap and others can run you out of town (almost certainly). This kind of thinking changes the perception of the value of one's network doesn't it? We all have to think about these things when we are building our network. It's the kind of stuff that makes for sleepless nights for some folks. Do we build it cheap since we don't own the spectrum and we could be overrun by spectrum hogs who come to town and trash the spectrum or do we build it strong and serve our customers well with expensive gear in hopes others would go broke trying to steal customers too loyal to leave our service? It is quite a conundrum. One that everyone here would undoubtedly have a slightly different answer for. I'd argue Alvarion type gear could maximize the value allocated for the infrastructure. I can see that. I can also see other's philosophies too. I do not think there is one silver bullet design / platform / business plan. I think there are about 1000 ways to get the job done in unlicensed. I can see the cream coming to the surface in a few business plans and platforms though. It is not too hard to see which ones are doing well. You do not hear much from those doing badlywho could blame them? It also depends on whetehr someone is trying to get 1X annual versus 6 x annnual. To get the high Xs, you need more than just revenue to sell. Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X unless they have a network doing 10s of millions of dollars a year in revenues or a smaller network with an ARPU of say $500 per sub. Then maybe I could see 6X. The flip view, is if the flexibilty of selling the Mikrotik can gain you revenue quicker (which would need debating), then it could be argued as an advantage to have higher rate of revenue growth than infrastructure credit.. I have a novel idea. Why doesn't Alvarion sell their basic radios and firmware in module form to Mikrotik or Mikrotik sell their software and routers to Alvarion and they put out a jointly developed, dual branded, certified Alvariok Radio! (Or is it Mikrovion?) Best of both worlds! Sorry folksit's the weekend. We're supposed to have a little fun right? Scriv -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)...
Butch Evans wrote: There are nearly 4000 (unfortunately not all mine :-) 100meg customers on that network. I don't want to argue this point, because I just don't have enough information about the network. I seriously doubt, though, that all those customers are all on a single /20 network (which would support 4096 hosts). Even worse, if there are routers there, too, it may need a /19 (which would accomodate over 8000 customers). If they are not, take my word for it...they are routed. You never know. Thanks to irony, my apartment is in a dead spot, where I can't get my own company's wireless service, so I've got a cable modem at home. Right now, my home router's IP address is assigned from a /20 - the router reports my network mask as 255.255.224.0, and my default gateway really is a couple thousand addresses away. Being a cable company with positively obscene amounts of money, I'd assume they're using some sort of fancy VLAN solution, or at least a really smart switch. But heck, I don't really know. One of these days, I'll be bored, and plug in the notebook, with Wireshark running, just to see what kind of other traffic I can see out there... David Smith MVN.net -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Alvarion vs Moto/802.11 network value
On 12/3/06, Tom DeReggi [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Somethings don't need proof, to be known to be true. I also don't feel there are many real world evaluations that give credability to what a valuation can end up being based on equipment. There are to many factors in a sale, to know exactly why the price was or wasn't gotten. My proof is just my own common sense, learned from communication with prospective buyers. I've NEVER heard a response Oh you have Alvarion, not sure I want to give you credit for that crap. It just doesn't happen. I don't even think the buyers understand the difference in the various gear. But it can never hurt you to a product that someone almost definately has heard of, and recognize as a name brand product. I personally would pay more for an Alvarion or Motorola network vs 802.11. I just wondered if there was anything behind the statement that an Alvarion network would bring more than Moto. Two name-brand networks - where Motorola certainly has greater recognition. But there is no substance behind the claim, so I can drop it now. Best, -- Dylan Oliver Primaverity, LLC -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
[WISPA] Broadband task force gets Humboldt representation
Ann Johnson-Stromberg/The Times-Standard Article Launched:12/02/2006 04:31:50 AM PST A month ago Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger ended the public battle with Caltrans over fee barriers to broadband deployment and now the North Coast's position on the front lines of the fight are paying off. The governor has appointed 21 people to his broadband task force and the only two appointees from rural areas in California were from Humboldt County. Humboldt State University President Rollin Richmond and Humboldt Area Foundation Executive Director Peter Pennekamp were on this list released by the governor's office late Thursday. The task force was created to get public and private stakeholders in broadband to collaborate on how to maximize and further broadband access and deployment in California. Pennekamp said that he considers this an incredible opportunity for the North Coast and was honored to be chosen. ”When they called me, personally I was slightly uncomfortable because there are probably 100 people more up to speed on this,” he said. “But I think the main point is that the issues that we face on the North Coast are the issues that rural California as a whole faces.” After nearly a three-year fight with Caltrans over fees to lay a fiber optic line along a 21-mile stretch of public roads between Pepperwood and Miranda, SBC (now ATT) paid $1.4 million in fees and completed construction in November of 2003. In April, the Times-Standard informed readers that Caltrans was in the process raising those fees, practically stomping on any hopes that the North Coast would be able to finance another project to bring in a redundant fiber optic connection. Schwarzenegger put a halt to the excessive right-of-way fees last month and announced a new cost-based fee structure. State officials said that the hope is that by building up broadband infrastructure, economic benefits will follow. Gregg Foster, executive director of the Redwood Region Economic Development Commission and board president for the Redwood Technology Consortium, said that Humboldt representation on the task force is a welcome development. ”I think we have some unique issues here that need to be addressed at a state level, in particular the need for redundancy, sort of a more robust network than our single fiber optic line,” Foster said, explaining that he is concerned about what a natural disaster could do to the region in terms of cutting off communications access. “I am pleased we have two people appointed from here because we want to make sure that issue is considered.” Richmond was unavailable for comment by deadline. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] WISPA has a new Vendor Menber - Welcome FSM Marketing Group, Inc.
Thank you John, for that kind introduction. I am looking forward to working with WISPA and supporting the members of the association. While I have not operated or worked for a WISP, there are many of the same issues I once had when operating our dialup ISP. If I may, I would like to provide a little background history of how we got started with Postini. In early 2003 a few of our old ISP domains were getting hit with direct harvest - DHA's and were bogging down the shared servers were we using. In all, there were only 3 emails that covered those domains, but in the past some 225k mailboxes were used. Apparently, email accounts take a while to die out as well as the spammers hitting anything they can find. The server was seeing some 50-100k SMTP attempts and our host provider asked that we move those domains to a dedicated box with some edge filtering. Since adding another appliance would not solve the bandwidth issue, it would also be another point of failure to potentially contend with. I called Postini and took a test drive and was pleased with the results. Just before our 30-day trial was just about to run out, our Postini representative asked if I would be willing to become a Postini Partner in reselling their services to companies like ours and other ISP, Webhosts etc. I said why not and took the challenge. Now fast forward 3-1/2 years and I feel we are at the right time and place to venture out beyond our normal sales channel and go directly to the market. I sincerely hope that I can be helpful to the members of WISPA, not only in providing a service, but in also providing any of my own experience or empirical knowledge. Postini may not be the right for everyone, but you also may have other customers looking for options and Postini may just be the right fit. Postini is easy to monetize additional revenue because of its structure of an outsourced solution. I will be talking more about these benefits in the weeks and months ahead. Sincerely, Frank Muto President FSM Marketing Group, Inc. Postini Partner - Original Message - From: John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 8:50 PM Subject: [WISPA] WISPA has a new Vendor Menber - Welcome FSM Marketing Group,Inc. Please join me in welcoming a true friend of the ISP / WISP industry as our newest Vendor Member, Frank Muto of FSM Marketing Group, Inc. Many of you already know Frank as a tireless advocate of all that is good for the WISP industry. He is joining WISPA to show his support and also to take the opportunity to offer spam filtering services that he sells to hundreds of other companies. I am looking forward to hearing more about what Frank is offering to us and I am certainly happy he has decided to make the move to joining WISPA formally. Here is a bit about Frank and FSM: FSM Marketing Group, Inc., was founded by Frank Muto in 1994 and incorporated in 2000. Starting in 1994, the business began providing web development and later in 1997 began offering hosting and dial-up Internet service. Since May of 2003, FSM provides Postini’s Perimeter Manager® for over 900 customer mail systems. As an authorized Postini Partner, FSM offers ISP’s, Web-hosts, IT consultants, integrators and businesses cost effective spam and virus filtering solutions, disaster recovery, message continuity and new and upgraded services on a continuous basis. Thank you again Frank, we look forward to working with you. Kindest regards, John Scrivner President WISPA -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. For example, If I bulit a network today, the very first day after it was turned live, there would be Zero customers and zero revenue, just monthly loss for the reoccuring fees that the company obligated themselves to. Would you then say the company was worthless because it had zero revenue? Selling on multiple of revenue would be stupid. If your neighbor thought you were a threat and wanted what you built, you would sell for the cost to build + ROI for creating the potential. Its very possible that a 6X evaluation 6 months after starting would be no where near the same profit margin in a sale as getting 1X after the second year. I got a 6X offer a number of years back and turned it down, because I like the business, I wasn't done yet, and it was way to early in the development of my company relating to revenue. If you bought a race car, would you sell it for revenue, before it ran its first race? Or even First year at the track? No. People buy the race car, for the hope it will allow them to win races in the future. Buying Alvarion is like buying a supercharged race car, that you want to guarantee can hold up on the track year after year without blowing engines. Where the trick comes in is having the revenue and the infrastructure in top form, racing to be the first to the finish line, to have as much revenue as poissible in the shortest period as can be, so infrastructure still has the highest value, so at evaluation day, you can maximize a ROI. I'm not saying Alvarion or Mikrotik is better for a WISP, I'm just saying, each of them has clear benefits over the other, and Alvarion's clearly is ruggedness. And that can't hurt an evaluation. (zero tax deduction for equipment depreciation). Great Point. That also reminds me that owning the CPE outright may not always be an advantage in an evaluation either. The buyer gets hit with heavy Property tax every year, that adds up to a significant amount. We are concidering owning the gear not more than the first year, and then switching to term contract after the first year, or giving it to them right from the start under a cancellable term contract, and (then when they renew the contract -idea 1), we give them the CPE, and secure the term contract with the gear. Because you can gift anything under $600 with out 1099, and CPE cost is less than $600, You could by pass property tax, sales tax, Possibly still get the full deduction of the gear (section 179), and still have the security of having term contract with subs to help bank financing and evaluations. This is a mute point for people that lease, but for people that pay cash, this may be a better tax way to do it. Disclaimer, I'm not an accountant, and still checking the viability of the idea. The end user contract can be cancellable any time without penalty, they just have to give you the gear back as condition of breaking the term. The only disadavantage I saw of this, is that on the balance sheet it would show less assets owned by the comapny, but it could still be reflected on the books as a dollar value of security as collateral for revenue. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 11:31 AM Subject: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations Tom DeReggi wrote: The big thing here is... Is one selling revenue or selling a network? Both. No way around it. If one is selling revenue, the buyer could probably care less what allows the revenue to happen. I have been looking at other WISPs around me for possible merge / acquisition and I do care. I am a potential buyer of WISPs. I understand the costs related to forklift upgrades or high costs related to OPEX of a network if things are not done the way they need to be done. It most certainly matters to me. But personally, I Don;t want to jsut sell revenue, I want to get credit for my infrastructure also. If a network is installed right, with the right gear, it should be worth MORE than the cost to buy the gear new uninstalled, NOT LESS as used gear. Exactly. Understand this though also. If I am buying a WISP and he has depreciated all the gear before I bought his corporation then I am a fool to value his gear higher (zero tax deduction for equipment depreciation). Please do not think this means that fast depreciation is a bad thing. It most certainly is not. Good infrastructure could make or break a deal though too. I would never pay a good price for a network I did not think was already built solid and reliable. Why bother? I could always over-build my own network if I thought the existing network
Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
How many ip addys does each customer need in a fully routed network? gateway, ip and broadcast. I see that as three. Or does a /30 use up four? Either way, by bridging each customer only needs one. The benefits that come with routing to each customer can be made up for by using a router and/or firewall at each cpe and by blocking client to client communications. Both this and routing result in the same thing eh? Customers don't mess with the other customers or the network. marlon - Original Message - From: Brad Belton [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 8:57 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients Hello Marlon, How do you figure a residential client (or any client for that matter) ties up three IPs? I can see four IPs (/30) or simply one IP out of a larger subnet dedicated to the sector. We typically assign a /29, /28 or /27 to a Trango 60* sector and assign one public IP to each CPE router. The radios get private space to conserve public IP space as well as increase security. IMO, each client deserves one public IP for a variety of reasons. Two come quickly to mind. First, if a client becomes infected with a SPAM virus he'll only get himself blacklisted and not a bunch of clients that happen to also be NAT'd behind the same IP address. Second, even a basic cable modem client gets one public IP address. No reason to give the cable guy a leg up over your service over one IP! Best, Brad -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Marlon K. Schafer Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 10:36 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 11:51 AM Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On Sat, 2 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: Yeah, the waters in the routed vs. bridged argument are getting more and more muddied all of the time. How many wasted ip's are there in a routed network? Lots. This is a big misconception. I don't have time to go into it here, but the truth of the matter is that what you are calling wasted is better described as a cost in exchange for a benefit. It's a very high cost. Why does every residential user need to tie up 3 ip addys? How long can we keep handing them out like that before we run into trouble again? There is only so much nat that we're gonna get away with. What are the benefits of a routed network? More control and better customer isolation. This is only one of the benefits. Scalability especially in a wireless network is a benefit. Alvarion offering VLAN will provide some of the scalability and other benefits that routing will offer. If you think that VLANs are a scalable solution, look over the networks owned by the tier 1 providers and see what they are using...routed with BGP. With the new ap's that block client to client isolation, with vlan switches, bandwidth controlling cpe (or other solutions) and features like what Patrick is talking about routing is becoming less and less critical every day. No...it's becoming less and less used toward the customer because more and more people are getting into the business of providing internet service without understanding HOW or WHY their network would function better if it were not bridged. You can argue that point if you want, but I have moved more networks from bridged to routed with positive results than the other way around. (there is one notable exception, but I think those results are a bit skewed for other reasons.) Is bridging easier? Yes. Is it common? Among smaller providers, yes. Is is scalable? Only if you use some other technology (such as vlan) to create the separation between the endpoints. As I said, even with VLANs, there is a limit to the scale the network can reach without some routing. solution. They vlan customers into a single port to the isp. Basically frame a fancy switch, almost frame relay. No routing used at all. We don't even have a good option for routing at the You don't think their networks are routed? Look at your border router...the public interface is going to have a /30 address...your range of public IP space is routed via that /30 address. You are incorrect in your assumption that there is no routing used at all. On the client side that's not correct. We have ONE vlan port. ALL of our fiber customers connect right in to that vlan. That vlan hits a switch on our network, right beside one of the main wireless links. No routing till it hits the customer's site. customer other than doing it just because. It's certainly not a requirement. No...not a requirement. It's just a more scalable solution. There are nearly 4000 (unfortunately not all mine :-) 100meg customers on that network. Maybe if
Re: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)...
- Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 10:44 PM Subject: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... On Sat, 2 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: It's a very high cost. Why does every residential user need to tie up 3 ip addys? How long can we keep handing them out like that before we run into trouble again? There is only so much nat that we're gonna get away with. I give up...why does a residential user need 3 ips? I never suggested that they did. And I guess I don't understand what nat has to do with any of it. OK, what's the minimum number of ip addys that a routed customer HAS to use? I thought it was three. Is it really two or four instead? Either way, it's a waste of ip addresses. NAT matters because it's the only way many of us would ever get enough ip addys for every customer AND every device on the network. For customers that increasinly need two way communications NAT isn't a good option. Then there's the CALEA crap. How in the world is a person going to track EVERY packet in his network? And those doing NAT may well have to as ALL customers behind a nat'd address show up as the one public addy. That's not gonna help anyone find that Kiddie porn freak. So what will we have to do to comply? Don't know for sure yet, but I certinly think that it'll be much easier to deal with the issue if every customer has a public ip. No...not a requirement. It's just a more scalable solution. There are nearly 4000 (unfortunately not all mine :-) 100meg customers on that network. I don't want to argue this point, because I just don't have enough information about the network. I seriously doubt, though, that all those customers are all on a single /20 network (which would support 4096 hosts). Even worse, if there are routers there, too, it may need a /19 (which would accomodate over 8000 customers). If they are not, take my word for it...they are routed. They are routed to the world at the isp. But they are NOT routed within the network. They are vlan'd. Some isp's may have multiple vlans or some such thing, but I'd be surprised at that. I'm just saying that it's far less important than it used to be. With the proliferation of worms being what it is, and most of them spreading by broadcast to the local network? You must be kidding... Nope. We block client to client communications at the ap (and hopefully soon at the switch). The worms can only get sideways on my network by going through the router, which under your theory will block them. Also, we require all customers have a firewall and antivirus. In theory we actually have several levels of protection in place against just such problems. OK, I've had enough fun poking at the religious right on the routed vs. bridged debate. The reality of the situation (as with so many things in life) is that both are used and both do a better job if used in the right places. Right tool for the right job. And EVERYONE's job is a different one. The isp has to be able to make smart choices for his network. Talk about all or nothing in either direction isn't really helpful in my mind. How's that? marlon -- Butch Evans Network Engineering and Security Consulting 573-276-2879 http://www.butchevans.com/ Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
Tom, I do not mind having my posts clipped for content when replying but I do mind it when you do it mid-sentence and change what I said. My sentence read, Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X unless they have a network doing 10s of millions of dollars a year in revenues or a smaller network with an ARPU of say $500 per sub. Then maybe I could see 6X. Tom DeReggi wrote: Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. Actually I do not think I am wrong. If you can find a single case to back up that I am out of line in my thinking then please share it before saying I am wrong. I do not think 6X has ever been paid unless there were some other outrageous value propositions involved in the deal. I do not think I am wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. For example, If I bulit a network today, the very first day after it was turned live, there would be Zero customers and zero revenue, just monthly loss for the reoccuring fees that the company obligated themselves to. Would you then say the company was worthless because it had zero revenue? From a resell standpoint, at that moment in time, your company could well be worth less than what you paid to build it. It is just like driving a car off the lot. It depreciates thousands of dollars the first few feet off the lot. Selling on multiple of revenue would be stupid. If your neighbor thought you were a threat and wanted what you built, you would sell for the cost to build + ROI for creating the potential. Its very possible that a 6X evaluation 6 months after starting would be no where near the same profit margin in a sale as getting 1X after the second year. Let's get this straight. I was not insinuating that the 6X had to include the assets of the company. There is always a settling of debt and equity in a deal like this that has no part in the valuation of the multiples of revenues. It looks like this (multiple of revenues + cash + assets - debt = selling price) At least this is how I have done it when working with others on both sides of the table. I got a 6X offer a number of years back and turned it down, because I like the business, I wasn't done yet, and it was way to early in the development of my company relating to revenue. If you bought a race car, would you sell it for revenue, before it ran its first race? Or even First year at the track? No. People buy the race car, for the hope it will allow them to win races in the future. Buying Alvarion is like buying a supercharged race car, that you want to guarantee can hold up on the track year after year without blowing engines. Where the trick comes in is having the revenue and the infrastructure in top form, racing to be the first to the finish line, to have as much revenue as poissible in the shortest period as can be, so infrastructure still has the highest value, so at evaluation day, you can maximize a ROI. I'm not saying Alvarion or Mikrotik is better for a WISP, I'm just saying, each of them has clear benefits over the other, and Alvarion's clearly is ruggedness. And that can't hurt an evaluation. (zero tax deduction for equipment depreciation). Great Point. That also reminds me that owning the CPE outright may not always be an advantage in an evaluation either. The buyer gets hit with heavy Property tax every year, that adds up to a significant amount. Property tax? Explain please. I do not know what you are talking about here. I have always thought of property taxes as having to do with real estate. Are you talking about having to pay taxes on asset values after depreciation? We are concidering owning the gear not more than the first year, and then switching to term contract after the first year, or giving it to them right from the start under a cancellable term contract, and (then when they renew the contract -idea 1), we give them the CPE, and secure the term contract with the gear. Because you can gift anything under $600 with out 1099, and CPE cost is less than $600, You could by pass property tax, sales tax, Possibly still get the full deduction of the gear (section 179), and still have the security of having term contract with subs to help bank financing and evaluations. This is a mute point for people that lease, but for people that pay cash, this may be a better tax way to do it. Tom, sorry to act like your 6th grade English teacher but the term is moot point not mute point. Remember Tom, a friend will tell you if you have food on your face at dinner. You had some on your face. Disclaimer, I'm not an accountant, and still checking the viability of the idea. The end user contract can be cancellable any time without penalty, they just have to give you the gear back as condition of breaking the term. The only disadavantage I saw of this, is that on the
RE: [WISPA] WISPA has a new Vendor Member - Welcome FSM MarketingGroup, Inc.
Welcome Frank! I am really glad to see you here and even more glad to see you and your Company becoming a part of WISPA. I feel that we will be good for each other and look forward to a long fruitful relationship. Sincerely, Mac Dearman Maximum Access, LLC. Rayville, La. www.inetsouth.com www.radioresponse.org (Katrina relief) www.mac-tel.us (VoIP sales) 318.728.8600 318.728.9600 318.303.4182 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Frank Muto Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 10:56 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] WISPA has a new Vendor Menber - Welcome FSM MarketingGroup, Inc. Thank you John, for that kind introduction. I am looking forward to working with WISPA and supporting the members of the association. While I have not operated or worked for a WISP, there are many of the same issues I once had when operating our dialup ISP. If I may, I would like to provide a little background history of how we got started with Postini. In early 2003 a few of our old ISP domains were getting hit with direct harvest - DHA's and were bogging down the shared servers were we using. In all, there were only 3 emails that covered those domains, but in the past some 225k mailboxes were used. Apparently, email accounts take a while to die out as well as the spammers hitting anything they can find. The server was seeing some 50-100k SMTP attempts and our host provider asked that we move those domains to a dedicated box with some edge filtering. Since adding another appliance would not solve the bandwidth issue, it would also be another point of failure to potentially contend with. I called Postini and took a test drive and was pleased with the results. Just before our 30-day trial was just about to run out, our Postini representative asked if I would be willing to become a Postini Partner in reselling their services to companies like ours and other ISP, Webhosts etc. I said why not and took the challenge. Now fast forward 3-1/2 years and I feel we are at the right time and place to venture out beyond our normal sales channel and go directly to the market. I sincerely hope that I can be helpful to the members of WISPA, not only in providing a service, but in also providing any of my own experience or empirical knowledge. Postini may not be the right for everyone, but you also may have other customers looking for options and Postini may just be the right fit. Postini is easy to monetize additional revenue because of its structure of an outsourced solution. I will be talking more about these benefits in the weeks and months ahead. Sincerely, Frank Muto President FSM Marketing Group, Inc. Postini Partner - Original Message - From: John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 8:50 PM Subject: [WISPA] WISPA has a new Vendor Menber - Welcome FSM Marketing Group,Inc. Please join me in welcoming a true friend of the ISP / WISP industry as our newest Vendor Member, Frank Muto of FSM Marketing Group, Inc. Many of you already know Frank as a tireless advocate of all that is good for the WISP industry. He is joining WISPA to show his support and also to take the opportunity to offer spam filtering services that he sells to hundreds of other companies. I am looking forward to hearing more about what Frank is offering to us and I am certainly happy he has decided to make the move to joining WISPA formally. Here is a bit about Frank and FSM: FSM Marketing Group, Inc., was founded by Frank Muto in 1994 and incorporated in 2000. Starting in 1994, the business began providing web development and later in 1997 began offering hosting and dial-up Internet service. Since May of 2003, FSM provides Postini's Perimeter ManagerR for over 900 customer mail systems. As an authorized Postini Partner, FSM offers ISP's, Web-hosts, IT consultants, integrators and businesses cost effective spam and virus filtering solutions, disaster recovery, message continuity and new and upgraded services on a continuous basis. Thank you again Frank, we look forward to working with you. Kindest regards, John Scrivner President WISPA -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
On Sun, 3 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: How many ip addys does each customer need in a fully routed network? gateway, ip and broadcast. I see that as three. Or does a /30 use up four? The customer will still use 1. Either way, by bridging each customer only needs one. your customers don't have a gateway? The only difference in routing and bridging as far as this is concerned, is where the gateway IP resides. The benefits that come with routing to each customer can be made up for by using a router and/or firewall at each cpe and by blocking client to client communications. Both this and routing result in the same thing eh? Customers don't mess with the other customers or the network. Controlling client to client comms on a single AP will only limit access to other clients of the same AP...It will not prevent customer a on AP1 from communicating with customer a on AP2. -- Butch Evans Network Engineering and Security Consulting 573-276-2879 http://www.butchevans.com/ Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)...
I can't believe I am getting involved in this... First, routing is not bad, or the best solution. Bridging is not bad, or the best solution. Network DESIGN is the solution. A hybrid network DESIGNED by a competent network person will outperform a pure bridged network or a pure routed network any day. PERIOD. I am not going to go into the technical aspects of why routing versus bridging is good, and bad. It all depends on what you are trying to accomplish, what your customers are trying to accomplish, your market, your competion, what equipment you are using, your budget, your staff's experience, failover protection, outage isolation, QoS, Security, Mail, SLA requirements and about 100 other factors. Let me say this, I administer about 70 routing devices, ranging from Cisco 7206 routers, Cisco Catalyst L3 switches, down to Mikrotik 532's. I also manage some pretty HUGE bridged segments on our network. I've seen routed networks be brought to their knees, I've seen bridged network do the same. The difference in our case is that we DESIGNED the network. We also have several dozen VLAN's on our network -- there is a misconception that using VLANs means you are bridging - well, no. Its hybrid, and in the end, it is ultimatly routing. And again, public IPs versus Private IPs to a customer is a whole different story, we have both on our network - it depends on what you are trying to accomplish. There is no need to give a /30 to every customer, there are other more efficent ways of doing this. With a /30 your using up 4 addresses, 1-Network Address 1-Router Address 1-Customer Address and 1-Broadcast address. There is an argument that bridging is easy, yeah, until something goes wrong. There is an argument that routing is easy -- until something goes wrong. Many of you are die-hard routing people, many of your are die-hard bridgers. That's fine -- but stay away from my network :-) So, in case you missed the point of this email NETWORK DESIGN is the best solution. Thanks, Russ Kreigh Network Engineer OnlyInternet.Net Broadband Wireless Supernova Technologies Office: (800) 363-0989 Direct: (260) 827-2486 Fax:(260) 824-9624 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.oibw.net -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Marlon K. Schafer Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 12:41 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 10:44 PM Subject: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... On Sat, 2 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: It's a very high cost. Why does every residential user need to tie up 3 ip addys? How long can we keep handing them out like that before we run into trouble again? There is only so much nat that we're gonna get away with. I give up...why does a residential user need 3 ips? I never suggested that they did. And I guess I don't understand what nat has to do with any of it. OK, what's the minimum number of ip addys that a routed customer HAS to use? I thought it was three. Is it really two or four instead? Either way, it's a waste of ip addresses. NAT matters because it's the only way many of us would ever get enough ip addys for every customer AND every device on the network. For customers that increasinly need two way communications NAT isn't a good option. Then there's the CALEA crap. How in the world is a person going to track EVERY packet in his network? And those doing NAT may well have to as ALL customers behind a nat'd address show up as the one public addy. That's not gonna help anyone find that Kiddie porn freak. So what will we have to do to comply? Don't know for sure yet, but I certinly think that it'll be much easier to deal with the issue if every customer has a public ip. No...not a requirement. It's just a more scalable solution. There are nearly 4000 (unfortunately not all mine :-) 100meg customers on that network. I don't want to argue this point, because I just don't have enough information about the network. I seriously doubt, though, that all those customers are all on a single /20 network (which would support 4096 hosts). Even worse, if there are routers there, too, it may need a /19 (which would accomodate over 8000 customers). If they are not, take my word for it...they are routed. They are routed to the world at the isp. But they are NOT routed within the network. They are vlan'd. Some isp's may have multiple vlans or some such thing, but I'd be surprised at that. I'm just saying that it's far less important than it used to be. With the proliferation of worms being what it is, and most of them spreading by broadcast to the local network? You must be kidding... Nope. We block client to client communications at the ap (and hopefully soon at the switch). The worms can only get sideways on
RE: SPAM ? Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
Marlon says: How many ip addys does each customer need in a fully routed network? * One! gateway, ip and broadcast. I see that as three. Or does a /30 use up four? * That depends on how many clients you have off that AP. I generally use a /24 at each tower - or a group of smaller towers. Then all clients off those towers share a mutual broadcast and gateway IP. Either way, by bridging each customer only needs one. * Same as a routed network. The benefits that come with routing to each customer can be made up for by using a router and/or firewall at each cpe and by blocking client to client communications. Both this and routing result in the same thing eh? Customers don't mess with the other customers or the network. * Even in a routed network clients on the same /24 can see one another unless you kill the intra bss ability. Depending on the amount of private IPs you are doing NAT on and where you do it - -I can NAT everyone on my network or just each /24 with 1 public IP that is a part of a /24, /29 /27 ...etc Its really no waste if done in this fashion. Mac marlon - Original Message - From: Brad Belton [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 8:57 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients Hello Marlon, How do you figure a residential client (or any client for that matter) ties up three IPs? I can see four IPs (/30) or simply one IP out of a larger subnet dedicated to the sector. We typically assign a /29, /28 or /27 to a Trango 60* sector and assign one public IP to each CPE router. The radios get private space to conserve public IP space as well as increase security. IMO, each client deserves one public IP for a variety of reasons. Two come quickly to mind. First, if a client becomes infected with a SPAM virus he'll only get himself blacklisted and not a bunch of clients that happen to also be NAT'd behind the same IP address. Second, even a basic cable modem client gets one public IP address. No reason to give the cable guy a leg up over your service over one IP! Best, Brad -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Marlon K. Schafer Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 10:36 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 11:51 AM Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On Sat, 2 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: Yeah, the waters in the routed vs. bridged argument are getting more and more muddied all of the time. How many wasted ip's are there in a routed network? Lots. This is a big misconception. I don't have time to go into it here, but the truth of the matter is that what you are calling wasted is better described as a cost in exchange for a benefit. It's a very high cost. Why does every residential user need to tie up 3 ip addys? How long can we keep handing them out like that before we run into trouble again? There is only so much nat that we're gonna get away with. What are the benefits of a routed network? More control and better customer isolation. This is only one of the benefits. Scalability especially in a wireless network is a benefit. Alvarion offering VLAN will provide some of the scalability and other benefits that routing will offer. If you think that VLANs are a scalable solution, look over the networks owned by the tier 1 providers and see what they are using...routed with BGP. With the new ap's that block client to client isolation, with vlan switches, bandwidth controlling cpe (or other solutions) and features like what Patrick is talking about routing is becoming less and less critical every day. No...it's becoming less and less used toward the customer because more and more people are getting into the business of providing internet service without understanding HOW or WHY their network would function better if it were not bridged. You can argue that point if you want, but I have moved more networks from bridged to routed with positive results than the other way around. (there is one notable exception, but I think those results are a bit skewed for other reasons.) Is bridging easier? Yes. Is it common? Among smaller providers, yes. Is is scalable? Only if you use some other technology (such as vlan) to create the separation between the endpoints. As I said, even with VLANs, there is a limit to the scale the network can reach without some routing. solution. They vlan customers into a single port to the isp. Basically frame a fancy switch, almost frame relay. No routing used at all. We don't even have a good option for routing at the You don't think their networks are routed? Look at your border router...the public interface is going to have a /30 address...your range of public IP
RE: SPAM ? RE: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)...
Amen Amen Well said and I must confess - - way shorter than my previous post :-) Mac -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Russ Kreigh Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 1:03 PM To: 'WISPA General List' Subject: SPAM ? RE: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... Importance: Low I can't believe I am getting involved in this... First, routing is not bad, or the best solution. Bridging is not bad, or the best solution. Network DESIGN is the solution. A hybrid network DESIGNED by a competent network person will outperform a pure bridged network or a pure routed network any day. PERIOD. I am not going to go into the technical aspects of why routing versus bridging is good, and bad. It all depends on what you are trying to accomplish, what your customers are trying to accomplish, your market, your competion, what equipment you are using, your budget, your staff's experience, failover protection, outage isolation, QoS, Security, Mail, SLA requirements and about 100 other factors. Let me say this, I administer about 70 routing devices, ranging from Cisco 7206 routers, Cisco Catalyst L3 switches, down to Mikrotik 532's. I also manage some pretty HUGE bridged segments on our network. I've seen routed networks be brought to their knees, I've seen bridged network do the same. The difference in our case is that we DESIGNED the network. We also have several dozen VLAN's on our network -- there is a misconception that using VLANs means you are bridging - well, no. Its hybrid, and in the end, it is ultimatly routing. And again, public IPs versus Private IPs to a customer is a whole different story, we have both on our network - it depends on what you are trying to accomplish. There is no need to give a /30 to every customer, there are other more efficent ways of doing this. With a /30 your using up 4 addresses, 1-Network Address 1-Router Address 1-Customer Address and 1-Broadcast address. There is an argument that bridging is easy, yeah, until something goes wrong. There is an argument that routing is easy -- until something goes wrong. Many of you are die-hard routing people, many of your are die-hard bridgers. That's fine -- but stay away from my network :-) So, in case you missed the point of this email NETWORK DESIGN is the best solution. Thanks, Russ Kreigh Network Engineer OnlyInternet.Net Broadband Wireless Supernova Technologies Office: (800) 363-0989 Direct: (260) 827-2486 Fax:(260) 824-9624 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.oibw.net -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Marlon K. Schafer Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 12:41 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 10:44 PM Subject: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... On Sat, 2 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: It's a very high cost. Why does every residential user need to tie up 3 ip addys? How long can we keep handing them out like that before we run into trouble again? There is only so much nat that we're gonna get away with. I give up...why does a residential user need 3 ips? I never suggested that they did. And I guess I don't understand what nat has to do with any of it. OK, what's the minimum number of ip addys that a routed customer HAS to use? I thought it was three. Is it really two or four instead? Either way, it's a waste of ip addresses. NAT matters because it's the only way many of us would ever get enough ip addys for every customer AND every device on the network. For customers that increasinly need two way communications NAT isn't a good option. Then there's the CALEA crap. How in the world is a person going to track EVERY packet in his network? And those doing NAT may well have to as ALL customers behind a nat'd address show up as the one public addy. That's not gonna help anyone find that Kiddie porn freak. So what will we have to do to comply? Don't know for sure yet, but I certinly think that it'll be much easier to deal with the issue if every customer has a public ip. No...not a requirement. It's just a more scalable solution. There are nearly 4000 (unfortunately not all mine :-) 100meg customers on that network. I don't want to argue this point, because I just don't have enough information about the network. I seriously doubt, though, that all those customers are all on a single /20 network (which would support 4096 hosts). Even worse, if there are routers there, too, it may need a /19 (which would accomodate over 8000 customers). If they are not, take my word for it...they are routed. They are routed to the world at the isp. But they are NOT routed within the network. They are vlan'd. Some isp's may have multiple vlans or some such thing, but I'd be surprised at that. I'm
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
Tom DeReggi wrote: Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. Nope. No one is currently paying 6X. Most I have seen is 2.5X. Companies shopping come to me all the time to make connections. And I have not seen any pay more than 2.5x. And we are talking MRC not annual. Who pays for annual??? If I gave you 6x annual, I wouldn't make money for 7 years or more. Even at 2.5x MRC, I don't see any pay out for 5 months. 2.5 to pay you ; 2.5 to right the balance sheet. Oh, let me add that you can get 6X in STOCK! - Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
John Scrivner wrote: From a resell standpoint, at that moment in time, your company could well be worth less than what you paid to build it. It is just like driving a car off the lot. It depreciates thousands of dollars the first few feet off the lot. CLEC's are a great example of not getting back what you paid for it. Look at GX or Nuvox. Nuvox has $1B invested. $1B. They do $300M in revenue. No one is gonna pay $1B for it. A perfect example is L3 buying Progress for Under the terms of the agreement, Level 3 expects to pay total consideration of $137 million, consisting of $68.5 million in unregistered shares of Level 3 Common Stock and $68.5 million in cash. Progress has 9000 miles of fiber. They own that fiber, not IRU's or leased, but routed miles of fiber and conduit. Progress had about $20M in revenue. So they got 3.4x ARC, but did NOT get back the investment in 9000 miles of fiber. It is unlikely that any company can sell and recoup the cost of the network build out. You would need to have a network that is packed with revenue from multi-year contracted businesses, IMO. Regards, Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
A seller doesn't necessarilly need to allow the buyer to get an ROI on the existing revenue that he is buying. The buyer gets an ROI on the increased revenue (above what the company is already doing) that he generates after he buys it. If someone has a network that runs itself, and has clients that are likely to stay for a long time (for example an underserved area), a seller doesn't need to sell to get an equivellent of a 4x annual return, he just fires everyone, and collects the money for the next 4 years. If a business model is built on not having much reocurring cost to opperate and the revenue is close to profit, the seller hsa no reason to sell or give up his projected ROI. The buyer takes the risk of buying because, they know if they inject money in, they will get much higher revenue than currently exists. So the buyer is buying potential, of what they can make if they had the time to market, making money from day one without burn, opporuntity because they have the WISP's assets. A company that has 5 years left on their leases and already tapped the market, compared to someone who has it all paid off already and not began to touch the potential are not evaluated the same. I guess the point I'm making is evaluating on multiple of annual revenue is pointless for start ups. Its only relevant for mature companies. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Peter R. [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 2:54 PM Subject: Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations Tom DeReggi wrote: Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. Nope. No one is currently paying 6X. Most I have seen is 2.5X. Companies shopping come to me all the time to make connections. And I have not seen any pay more than 2.5x. And we are talking MRC not annual. Who pays for annual??? If I gave you 6x annual, I wouldn't make money for 7 years or more. Even at 2.5x MRC, I don't see any pay out for 5 months. 2.5 to pay you ; 2.5 to right the balance sheet. Oh, let me add that you can get 6X in STOCK! - Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
lol...Butch beat me to the punch. Marlon stated: How many ip addys does each customer need in a fully routed network? gateway, ip and broadcast. I see that as three. Or does a /30 use up four? I still don't see how you add what you stated above as three: Network (1) Gateway (2) IP (3) Broadcast (4) Nevertheless, a bridged network requires this many IPs no different than a routed network. The difference is routing requires the use of three additional IPs per segment of your network and not necessarily for each client. Here is a quick cheat sheet on subnets: /32 = one IP /31 = two IP subnet (rarely used) /30 = four IP subnet /29 = eight IP subnet /28 = sixteen IP subnet /27 = thirty-two IP subnet /26 = sixty-four IP subnet /25 = one hundred twenty-eight IP subnet /24 = two hundred fifty-six IP subnet etc, etc... So, for an example if you had a HUB site with four Sectors and each Sector has approx 25-50 clients you could do one of two things. Bridge the entire 100-200 clients into one large broadcast domain by bridging all four Sectors into one dumb switch or you could segment each Sector into its own subnet by routing your network. Certainly the bridging solution is easier to implement, but considering the risk of one client becoming infected and taking down the entire HUB vs. only one sector I would recommend routing. Simply place a five or more port router at the base of the tower and assign a /26 Subnet to each Sector. In doing this you've burned only nine more IP addresses routing vs. bridging to serve the same 200+ clients. The bridged design will burn three IPs vs. the routed design burning twelve, but again considering the benefits of routing over bridging this is a small price to pay. Best, Brad -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Butch Evans Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 1:07 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On Sun, 3 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: The customer will still use 1. Either way, by bridging each customer only needs one. your customers don't have a gateway? The only difference in routing and bridging as far as this is concerned, is where the gateway IP resides. The benefits that come with routing to each customer can be made up for by using a router and/or firewall at each cpe and by blocking client to client communications. Both this and routing result in the same thing eh? Customers don't mess with the other customers or the network. Controlling client to client comms on a single AP will only limit access to other clients of the same AP...It will not prevent customer a on AP1 from communicating with customer a on AP2. -- Butch Evans Network Engineering and Security Consulting 573-276-2879 http://www.butchevans.com/ Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
Not sure I follow you Dennis- are you purchasing these new for this price or is this what you are valuing them at takeover? Chris -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Dennis Burgess - 2K Wireless Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 1:25 PM To: 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients We are picking up 2.4 gig CPE/Routers, QOS, NAT, and DHCP is all built into the CPE, for what, 99 bucks! 150 something including a 19db antenna, where the 99 is a 12 db antenna. BTW, both are B/G and 400mw output. Good for here in MO with our dang HILLS! Dennis Burgess, MCP, CCNA, A+, N+, Mikrotik Certified [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.2kwireless.com 2K Wireless provides high-speed internet access, along with network consulting for WISPs, and business's with a focus on TCP/IP networking, security, and Mikrotik routers. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Patrick Leary Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 12:28 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients You missed the thread though Blair. Our CPEs are as low as $245 complete and only $285 for very low volume (25 a quarter). We have AUs now also for about $2500 MSRP (list price). And we can filter and control packets without a router, including broadcast packet rate limiting. Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Blair Davis Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 10:06 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients Why provide routers? To improve the isolation of the user from the network. To filter and control packets at the customer end before they clog up my wireless bandwidth. We run private IP space on our wireless network for the same reasons. We provide anti-virus and anti-spyware software for the same reasons. I'd love to be able to put up $500 cpe's and $5000 AP's But in my area, that would price me out of the market. We Patrick Leary wrote: Why do you have to have the router? The DSL and cable guys don't provide routers (not without extra fees). I provide my own in my home. At work we have our own router. VL also can do VLAN, all the way to QinQ 802.3ad VLANs. It does 802.1q. It does layer 2 802.1p. Layer 3 prioritization with IP TOS (RFC791) and DSCP (RFC2474). And layer 4 with UDP/TCP port range. And we can deliver real VoIP QoS with a MOS of 4.0 and better using our proprietary WLP (wireless link prioritization) protocol. (And that's not marketing goop, it's been tested by a tier 1 operator and it blew them away.) Plus, in the end the thing that I admit really gets me is that some of these products simply are not legal at all and are illegally shipped in from overseas. If we just blatantly flauted the laws we could save tons in RD and legal too. It has always been disappointing that some WISPs simply don't care about that. Especially when at the same time the same WISP might complain that another WISP is over driving a system. Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Butch Evans Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 8:24 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On Fri, 1 Dec 2006, Patrick Leary wrote: reduced truck roll, Where are you getting this? I have been in the ISP business longer than MOST people on this list. I have nothing bad to say about Alvarion equipment, but the fact is, that to use Alvarion gear in any network I would build, you would HAVE to add an addition cost for a router. SO, we would add another $25ish to the cost of your CPE. At this point, the price is exactly the same (or very close). NOW, let's talk about upsell capability. With the Alvarion solution (including a router), I could upgrade the speed, but that costs how much? I could offer a firewall, vpn, qos or other options, but I'd have to change the cost of the router from a $25 router to (at least) a $100 router. If I am able to hit one customer in an area, but the others have obscured LOS, I would have to build another AP somewhere, where with MT, I could just add an $80 (including antenna) upgrade to their router and offer service off that new AP. I can offer real options for firewall, vpn, qos from their ethernet port all the way to my network edge. Did I miss anything? Perhaps there are other options that Alvarion has that I missed. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ This footnote
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
So you are saying you haven't seen more than 2.5X the monthly revenue? We sold a division of our company for 12X the monthly revenue + the FMV of the equipment in 2001. The current going rate that I have seen is more around 12X monthly + equipment infrastructure. Travis Microserv Peter R. wrote: Tom DeReggi wrote: Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. Nope. No one is currently paying 6X. Most I have seen is 2.5X. Companies shopping come to me all the time to make connections. And I have not seen any pay more than 2.5x. And we are talking MRC not annual. Who pays for annual??? If I gave you 6x annual, I wouldn't make money for 7 years or more. Even at 2.5x MRC, I don't see any pay out for 5 months. 2.5 to pay you ; 2.5 to right the balance sheet. Oh, let me add that you can get 6X in STOCK! - Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
John, During the last ten years we have purchased and sold several ISP's... and I can tell you that you NEVER want to purchase the corporation. You want to do an asset only purchase. So you are buying the equipment (for whatever value you want to put on it) and the customer base. Then, whatever value you put on the equipment you can begin depreciating just like if you had purchased it from a vendor. The cool thing is this number can be whatever you want... because you can adjust the customer base number to match... So, if you decide you are going to pay $200,000 for this WISP (including equipment and customers), you may want the equipment to show $50,000 and the customer base to show $150,000 or you may want to do $100,000 / $100,000. This is something you would want to go over with your accountant before the actual purchase so it will fit best with your current business. Travis Microserv John Scrivner wrote: Tom DeReggi wrote: The big thing here is... Is one selling revenue or selling a network? Both. No way around it. If one is selling revenue, the buyer could probably care less what allows the revenue to happen. I have been looking at other WISPs around me for possible merge / acquisition and I do care. I am a potential buyer of WISPs. I understand the costs related to forklift upgrades or high costs related to OPEX of a network if things are not done the way they need to be done. It most certainly matters to me. But personally, I Don;t want to jsut sell revenue, I want to get credit for my infrastructure also. If a network is installed right, with the right gear, it should be worth MORE than the cost to buy the gear new uninstalled, NOT LESS as used gear. Exactly. Understand this though also. If I am buying a WISP and he has depreciated all the gear before I bought his corporation then I am a fool to value his gear higher (zero tax deduction for equipment depreciation). Please do not think this means that fast depreciation is a bad thing. It most certainly is not. Good infrastructure could make or break a deal though too. I would never pay a good price for a network I did not think was already built solid and reliable. Why bother? I could always over-build my own network if I thought the existing network was bad. It is harsh truth and we all know it happens. None of us own the spectrum we operate on. Build it right and others would go broke trying to overbuild you (we hope). Build it like crap and others can run you out of town (almost certainly). This kind of thinking changes the perception of the value of one's network doesn't it? We all have to think about these things when we are building our network. It's the kind of stuff that makes for sleepless nights for some folks. Do we build it cheap since we don't own the spectrum and we could be overrun by spectrum hogs who come to town and trash the spectrum or do we build it strong and serve our customers well with expensive gear in hopes others would go broke trying to steal customers too loyal to leave our service? It is quite a conundrum. One that everyone here would undoubtedly have a slightly different answer for. I'd argue Alvarion type gear could maximize the value allocated for the infrastructure. I can see that. I can also see other's philosophies too. I do not think there is one silver bullet design / platform / business plan. I think there are about 1000 ways to get the job done in unlicensed. I can see the cream coming to the surface in a few business plans and platforms though. It is not too hard to see which ones are doing well. You do not hear much from those doing badlywho could blame them? It also depends on whetehr someone is trying to get 1X annual versus 6 x annnual. To get the high Xs, you need more than just revenue to sell. Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X unless they have a network doing 10s of millions of dollars a year in revenues or a smaller network with an ARPU of say $500 per sub. Then maybe I could see 6X. The flip view, is if the flexibilty of selling the Mikrotik can gain you revenue quicker (which would need debating), then it could be argued as an advantage to have higher rate of revenue growth than infrastructure credit.. I have a novel idea. Why doesn't Alvarion sell their basic radios and firmware in module form to Mikrotik or Mikrotik sell their software and routers to Alvarion and they put out a jointly developed, dual branded, certified Alvariok Radio! (Or is it Mikrovion?) Best of both worlds! Sorry folksit's the weekend. We're supposed to have a little fun right? Scriv -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
I think in most cases I've seen they are referring to a multiple of yearly revenue not monthly. So your 12x monthly is equal to 1x yearly. Determining a valuation of a company is rarely performed with only one factor taken into account. Simply saying an operation is worth x times yearly revenue is silly as there are too many variables to take into consideration. Is company A that generates $1M in annual revenue worth more or less than company B that generates $500K in annual revenue? Nobody can answer that question until each company is thoroughly evaluated and even then it will be unlikely two independent parties will arrive at the same number. Regarding the equipment used, I believe a network built with carrier grade equipment will always be worth more than an Alvarion or similar best effort network. Backhaul infrastructure is far more important in the evaluation of network value than the CPE. CPE only continues to drop in price and therefore will only continue to drop in importance in the overall valuation of a network. The rollups with large money won't be looking at CPE equipment as a deciding factor because they will ultimately be replacing all CPE with their own proprietary gear probably a licensed product. Instead they will be looking at real estate assets, client base, contractual agreements and most importantly PROFITS just to name a few key sticking points. Best, Brad -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Travis Johnson Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 4:00 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations So you are saying you haven't seen more than 2.5X the monthly revenue? We sold a division of our company for 12X the monthly revenue + the FMV of the equipment in 2001. The current going rate that I have seen is more around 12X monthly + equipment infrastructure. Travis Microserv Peter R. wrote: Tom DeReggi wrote: Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. Nope. No one is currently paying 6X. Most I have seen is 2.5X. Companies shopping come to me all the time to make connections. And I have not seen any pay more than 2.5x. And we are talking MRC not annual. Who pays for annual??? If I gave you 6x annual, I wouldn't make money for 7 years or more. Even at 2.5x MRC, I don't see any pay out for 5 months. 2.5 to pay you ; 2.5 to right the balance sheet. Oh, let me add that you can get 6X in STOCK! - Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
Brad, This is where I have to disagree with you... what type of CPE is much more important for me than the backhaul used. As an example, if the CPE is 802.11b and they have 1,000 customers, I have to visit 1,000 locations and upgrade every single customer. However, if they are using Trango, Canopy or Alvarion and using 802.11b for backhaul (just for fun), then I only have to replace 30 or 40 backhaul radios and all the customers are set. Plus I have access to the tower locations 24 hours per day, rather than when customers are available. But I do agree, there are many, many factors involved in the value of a business... but the revenue multiplier seems to be the quickest way to determine a baseline. Travis Microserv Brad Belton wrote: I think in most cases I've seen they are referring to a multiple of yearly revenue not monthly. So your 12x monthly is equal to 1x yearly. Determining a valuation of a company is rarely performed with only one factor taken into account. Simply saying an operation is worth x times yearly revenue is silly as there are too many variables to take into consideration. Is company A that generates $1M in annual revenue worth more or less than company B that generates $500K in annual revenue? Nobody can answer that question until each company is thoroughly evaluated and even then it will be unlikely two independent parties will arrive at the same number. Regarding the equipment used, I believe a network built with carrier grade equipment will always be worth more than an Alvarion or similar best effort network. Backhaul infrastructure is far more important in the evaluation of network value than the CPE. CPE only continues to drop in price and therefore will only continue to drop in importance in the overall valuation of a network. The rollups with large money won't be looking at CPE equipment as a deciding factor because they will ultimately be replacing all CPE with their own proprietary gear probably a licensed product. Instead they will be looking at real estate assets, client base, contractual agreements and most importantly PROFITS just to name a few key sticking points. Best, Brad -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Travis Johnson Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 4:00 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations So you are saying you haven't seen more than 2.5X the monthly revenue? We sold a division of our company for 12X the monthly revenue + the FMV of the equipment in 2001. The current going rate that I have seen is more around 12X monthly + equipment infrastructure. Travis Microserv Peter R. wrote: Tom DeReggi wrote: Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. Nope. No one is currently paying 6X. Most I have seen is 2.5X. Companies shopping come to me all the time to make connections. And I have not seen any pay more than 2.5x. And we are talking MRC not annual. Who pays for annual??? If I gave you 6x annual, I wouldn't make money for 7 years or more. Even at 2.5x MRC, I don't see any pay out for 5 months. 2.5 to pay you ; 2.5 to right the balance sheet. Oh, let me add that you can get 6X in STOCK! - Peter RAD-INFO, Inc. -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] bare conduits
Yes Mrlon, Pulling cable in NoCAL, we made a 'y' for the compressor, Air in one side sponge-on-line in the straight side. Gave it to the guys, one was a careful guy. A little while later I pulled up to the site and the guys were all laughing, watch this ron!, they set it up for a 300' 'blow' and opened the air valve. That sponge flew about 30' in the air. Can be very dangerous,thou. -Original Message- From: Marlon K. Schafer [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, December 1, 2006 07:13 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], 'WISPA General List' Subject: Re: [WISPA] bare conduits Used to do this all the time when I was a linesman. The easiest and safest way to do this is to use a vacuum on one end. Tie a parachute or streamer to a string and put that in the pipe while someone's sucking on the other end. Make sure you hold the twine with a screwdriver and not your fingers cause it'll usually go pretty fast. Now, if that won't work, this will. Same thing on the string part but use a jackhammer type air compressor. You'll put your parachute/streamer in the conduit, then wrap a rag around an air hose. Put that assembly into the pipe but make sure that it's not binding where the string goes in. Then have someone else hold the string and yet another run the air compressor. Be VERY careful with this method. Things (sometimes very nasty things) come flying out the other end at a VERY high rate of speed. I learned the hard way that you don't want to be the guy standing in the manhole when things start moving. Have fun, be super careful. marlon - Original Message - From: chris cooper [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 9:24 AM Subject: [WISPA] bare conduits Im looking at a project that requires connectivity between multiple buildings on the same campus. There are 4 conduits connecting each facility. The conduits are bare, Id like to run fiber in them, and there are no pull cords in them. Some are several hundred yards long. Ive heard that you can blow a cable through a conduit. Can anyone enlighten me on equipment/technique for this application? Thanks Chris -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients
New.. www.highgainantennas.com. These are 2.4 though. You an do a 900 for what, a bit over 300. We charge 350 to make sure we are in the green. Dennis Burgess, MCP, CCNA, A+, N+, Mikrotik Certified [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.2kwireless.com 2K Wireless provides high-speed internet access, along with network consulting for WISPs, and business's with a focus on TCP/IP networking, security, and Mikrotik routers. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Chris Cooper Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 3:42 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients Not sure I follow you Dennis- are you purchasing these new for this price or is this what you are valuing them at takeover? Chris -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Dennis Burgess - 2K Wireless Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 1:25 PM To: 'WISPA General List' Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients We are picking up 2.4 gig CPE/Routers, QOS, NAT, and DHCP is all built into the CPE, for what, 99 bucks! 150 something including a 19db antenna, where the 99 is a 12 db antenna. BTW, both are B/G and 400mw output. Good for here in MO with our dang HILLS! Dennis Burgess, MCP, CCNA, A+, N+, Mikrotik Certified [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.2kwireless.com 2K Wireless provides high-speed internet access, along with network consulting for WISPs, and business's with a focus on TCP/IP networking, security, and Mikrotik routers. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Patrick Leary Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 12:28 AM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients You missed the thread though Blair. Our CPEs are as low as $245 complete and only $285 for very low volume (25 a quarter). We have AUs now also for about $2500 MSRP (list price). And we can filter and control packets without a router, including broadcast packet rate limiting. Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Blair Davis Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 10:06 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients Why provide routers? To improve the isolation of the user from the network. To filter and control packets at the customer end before they clog up my wireless bandwidth. We run private IP space on our wireless network for the same reasons. We provide anti-virus and anti-spyware software for the same reasons. I'd love to be able to put up $500 cpe's and $5000 AP's But in my area, that would price me out of the market. We Patrick Leary wrote: Why do you have to have the router? The DSL and cable guys don't provide routers (not without extra fees). I provide my own in my home. At work we have our own router. VL also can do VLAN, all the way to QinQ 802.3ad VLANs. It does 802.1q. It does layer 2 802.1p. Layer 3 prioritization with IP TOS (RFC791) and DSCP (RFC2474). And layer 4 with UDP/TCP port range. And we can deliver real VoIP QoS with a MOS of 4.0 and better using our proprietary WLP (wireless link prioritization) protocol. (And that's not marketing goop, it's been tested by a tier 1 operator and it blew them away.) Plus, in the end the thing that I admit really gets me is that some of these products simply are not legal at all and are illegally shipped in from overseas. If we just blatantly flauted the laws we could save tons in RD and legal too. It has always been disappointing that some WISPs simply don't care about that. Especially when at the same time the same WISP might complain that another WISP is over driving a system. Patrick Leary AVP WISP Markets Alvarion, Inc. o: 650.314.2628 c: 760.580.0080 Vonage: 650.641.1243 [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Butch Evans Sent: Friday, December 01, 2006 8:24 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: RE: [WISPA] 900 Mhz Mikrotik SR9 Clients On Fri, 1 Dec 2006, Patrick Leary wrote: reduced truck roll, Where are you getting this? I have been in the ISP business longer than MOST people on this list. I have nothing bad to say about Alvarion equipment, but the fact is, that to use Alvarion gear in any network I would build, you would HAVE to add an addition cost for a router. SO, we would add another $25ish to the cost of your CPE. At this point, the price is exactly the same (or very close). NOW, let's talk about upsell capability. With the Alvarion solution (including a router), I could upgrade the speed, but that costs how much? I could offer a firewall, vpn, qos or other options, but I'd have to change the cost of the router from a $25 router to (at least) a $100 router. If I am able to hit one customer in an area, but the others have obscured LOS, I
RE: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)...
On Sun, 3 Dec 2006, Mac Dearman wrote: SUMMARY: USE THE SHOE THAT FITS - ONE SIZE DOES NOT FIT ALL - EVER! This is good advice. For those that think I am religous regarding this argument, are mis-reading my statements. I am only dispelling bad information. At any rate, there is certainly a place for bridging and a place for routing in any network. VLANs offer still more functionality and (where it's appropriate), I always recommend it. I've simply found that there are few places where the overhead associated with VLANs is necessary or particularly useful in most of the networks I've designed. Either way, I think I'm moving on:-) -- Butch Evans Network Engineering and Security Consulting 573-276-2879 http://www.butchevans.com/ Mikrotik Certified Consultant (http://www.mikrotik.com/consultants.html) -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
Re: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)...
I can tell you from experience, confgiuring with VLAN can be encumbering (we do it almost everywhere), and I don't recommend it for everyone. But having the ability to configure it when you need it is really usefull. For example, lets say I have two client off of one sector, and I want to run seperate DHCP servers per business subscriber, or per project. I route 1 VLAN to one project and another VLAN to the other. Or when I want flexible IP assignment, or need to minimiz giving full blocks, How do I kkep one customer from misconfiguring his equipment and taking out another subscriber? Give them each there own VLAN. How do I seperate traffic between them so I can give them their own customer queues, I give them VLANs. VLAN allows central routing deliverdd via VLAN. But many times its simpler to take the routing all teh way to the last hop to the subscriber instead. For exampel Routing allows redundant path decissions to be made, without thinking of the complex bridge conflicts. The lsit goes on and on. I have many reasons to route at many locations and many places to VLAN. I think the best solution is to have the flexibilty to be able to do either or both, when and where ever a need arises. But then management of it all gets a mess, when a million different things are gettting done. So the real question is not wether to route or bridge, it is how do you track / document it all? Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: Russ Kreigh [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 2:03 PM Subject: RE: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... I can't believe I am getting involved in this... First, routing is not bad, or the best solution. Bridging is not bad, or the best solution. Network DESIGN is the solution. A hybrid network DESIGNED by a competent network person will outperform a pure bridged network or a pure routed network any day. PERIOD. I am not going to go into the technical aspects of why routing versus bridging is good, and bad. It all depends on what you are trying to accomplish, what your customers are trying to accomplish, your market, your competion, what equipment you are using, your budget, your staff's experience, failover protection, outage isolation, QoS, Security, Mail, SLA requirements and about 100 other factors. Let me say this, I administer about 70 routing devices, ranging from Cisco 7206 routers, Cisco Catalyst L3 switches, down to Mikrotik 532's. I also manage some pretty HUGE bridged segments on our network. I've seen routed networks be brought to their knees, I've seen bridged network do the same. The difference in our case is that we DESIGNED the network. We also have several dozen VLAN's on our network -- there is a misconception that using VLANs means you are bridging - well, no. Its hybrid, and in the end, it is ultimatly routing. And again, public IPs versus Private IPs to a customer is a whole different story, we have both on our network - it depends on what you are trying to accomplish. There is no need to give a /30 to every customer, there are other more efficent ways of doing this. With a /30 your using up 4 addresses, 1-Network Address 1-Router Address 1-Customer Address and 1-Broadcast address. There is an argument that bridging is easy, yeah, until something goes wrong. There is an argument that routing is easy -- until something goes wrong. Many of you are die-hard routing people, many of your are die-hard bridgers. That's fine -- but stay away from my network :-) So, in case you missed the point of this email NETWORK DESIGN is the best solution. Thanks, Russ Kreigh Network Engineer OnlyInternet.Net Broadband Wireless Supernova Technologies Office: (800) 363-0989 Direct: (260) 827-2486 Fax:(260) 824-9624 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.oibw.net -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Marlon K. Schafer Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 12:41 PM To: WISPA General List Subject: Re: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... - Original Message - From: Butch Evans [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Saturday, December 02, 2006 10:44 PM Subject: [WISPA] Routed vs bridged (again)... On Sat, 2 Dec 2006, Marlon K. Schafer wrote: It's a very high cost. Why does every residential user need to tie up 3 ip addys? How long can we keep handing them out like that before we run into trouble again? There is only so much nat that we're gonna get away with. I give up...why does a residential user need 3 ips? I never suggested that they did. And I guess I don't understand what nat has to do with any of it. OK, what's the minimum number of ip addys that a routed customer HAS to use? I thought it was three. Is it really two or four instead? Either way, it's a waste of ip addresses. NAT matters because it's the
Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations
John, My error, sorry about that. But I disagree still with your comment. I think I may be being misunderstood. I'd argue that a company doing millions of dollars and/or Smaller High ARPU business are LESS LIKELY to get higher Multiples. The reason is that the businesses are already matured if they are doing that, and the potential is not what is being sold, because the potential had already been realized. So a mature business is bought on multiple of revenue. Where high multiples are given are for very young and non-matured companies, when the yearly revenue may still be very very small, sometimes even a fraction of what the investment was to build the network intially/recently. Higher multiple does not necessarilly mean higher profit/ROI at sale time. There is a misconception that I often hear from buyers, Why should I pay you more than it cost you to build your network, or for me to build a new network on top of yours with newer technology? The reasons is that one's network is a engine to generate revenue. There were many costs to build the network way beyond the cost of the equipment itself. Contract negotiations, planning, demographics, Site planning, labor, brand awareness, time to market, first in real estate advantage, etc. The longer someone waits after building their network to go to the deal table, could mean lowering their multiple, but the longer they wait, the more likely they'll have more revenue to get a multiple on. The only time soneone should get less money for their equipment installed than they paid for it, is if it has lost its value because it has become obsolete or inadequate for the job compared to new trends in technology or the market place. Thats is why a seller of a 802.11b network will get very little value for thier infrastructure, but a Alvarion or Trango type network will be more likely to hold its value. I'm uncertain what a 802.11a Mikrotik.StarOS type network would evaluate for. It's not certified/legal, but it still has current day speed, and as advanced features as most would ever need. I also think a lot of this depends on who being sold to. If you are selling to a telco, I'd argue that many Unlicensed networks will not get full value consideration for the hardware infrastructure. Thats just because of the hype to need WiMax, or higher bandwdith technology that is telephone grade, such as 100mbps and gb technology. But if you have Canopy and selling to earthlink, or using Mikrotik and selling to another Mikrotik WISP, or Trango selling to a Trango roll up, I'd argue that having that gear is an asset. I think getting the beset evaluation is picking the right buyer for your type network. We could go top the extreme and argue that if you are selling to a national Hotspot roll up, You'd be worth more if your network was 802.11b. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband - Original Message - From: John Scrivner [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org Sent: Sunday, December 03, 2006 1:11 PM Subject: Re: [WISPA] Network Valuation Considerations Tom, I do not mind having my posts clipped for content when replying but I do mind it when you do it mid-sentence and change what I said. My sentence read, Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X unless they have a network doing 10s of millions of dollars a year in revenues or a smaller network with an ARPU of say $500 per sub. Then maybe I could see 6X. Tom DeReggi wrote: Nobody in unlicensed is going to get 6X Thats where you are wrong. Actually I do not think I am wrong. If you can find a single case to back up that I am out of line in my thinking then please share it before saying I am wrong. I do not think 6X has ever been paid unless there were some other outrageous value propositions involved in the deal. I do not think I am wrong. However, the value of a higher Multiple is relevent to the amount of customers one has and what stage of development the company is in. For example, If I bulit a network today, the very first day after it was turned live, there would be Zero customers and zero revenue, just monthly loss for the reoccuring fees that the company obligated themselves to. Would you then say the company was worthless because it had zero revenue? From a resell standpoint, at that moment in time, your company could well be worth less than what you paid to build it. It is just like driving a car off the lot. It depreciates thousands of dollars the first few feet off the lot. Selling on multiple of revenue would be stupid. If your neighbor thought you were a threat and wanted what you built, you would sell for the cost to build + ROI for creating the potential. Its very possible that a 6X evaluation 6 months after starting would be no where near the same profit margin in a sale as getting 1X after the second year. Let's get this straight. I was not insinuating that the 6X
