RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-07-05 Thread chris cooper
Sounds like a mighty long ROI..
c
-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Patrick Leary
Sent: Wednesday, July 05, 2006 12:25 PM
To: 'WISPA General List'
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale
Program

Earthlink primarily uses Tropos mesh, with about 40-50 nodes per square
mile
backhauled with Canopy 5GHz on about a 1:3 (mesh:Canopy) ratio. 

Patrick 

-Original Message-
From: John Scrivner [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
Sent: Wednesday, July 05, 2006 9:07 AM
To: WISPA General List
Subject: Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale
Program

Can you tell us how this network is structured? How many Tropos units 
per backhaul radio are used? What platform is used for backhaul? Is it 
5, 2.4 or 900 for backhaul? How is the performance of this network? 
Anything else you can share is appreciated.
Scriv


Anthony Will wrote:

 Im in MN where the city of Chaska has had a large tropos network 
 running for a couple years.  About 80% of in home customers have to 
 purchase a wireless modem  (CB3) to get a stable signal in their
home.

 Anthony Will
 Broadband Corp.

 On 7/3/06, *Charles Wu* [EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

 Hi Tom,

 The WHOLE PURPOSE of a WiFi Mesh Network Strategy is to AVOID THE
 COST OF
 THE CPE  TRUCK ROLL

 Now -- whether this theory works in practice is a whole nother
issue

 -Charles

 P.S. FWIW - personally, I find the the concept (from an ROI
 perspective) of
 a service provider WiFi mesh to be a bit far-fetched, but then
 again, 10
 years ago, I told the founder of half.com http://half.com that
 you was bonkers, and proceded
 to get into the wireless biz =/

 ---
 CWLab
 Technology Architects
 http://www.cwlab.com



 -Original Message-
 From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
 mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On
 Behalf Of Tom DeReggi
 Sent: Monday, July 03, 2006 3:03 PM
 To: WISPA General List
 Subject: Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces
 Wholesale Program


 The primary difference being that in the Canopy Fixed Wireless you
are
 including end user CPE. The largest cost to detur take rate when
 WISPS make
 subs pay for it.

 Its likely that one can assume that many of the subscribers will
 need to
 install outdoor equipment (adding $100-$300 BUCKS), to reliably
 connect to
 the mesh.  So you could easilly add $1.5 million to the mesh cost
 for CPE,
 or remove $1.5million from the Fix Wireless plan if you were going
to
 compare apples to apples.

 What Mesh still has on its side is mobility.  The question is what
 value
 should a WISP put on that. Mobility can be easilly be the reason
 to justify
 why a muni should support a oublic interest project. (cable and
 DSL go to
 the home but NOT mobile for teh community to share.).  Mobilty
 also allow
 Muni type applications, such as to support travelling users
 (commerce), or
 Mobile government work force.  Mesh also gives Muni bargining
 power in the
 deployment, as it uses an asset of value that the governement has
 to trade
 and offer (easements, light poles, and power from them).

 In a Fixed Wireless deployment it could easilly be argued that teh
 givernemnt has little assets of value to the provider. Its usually
 the
 independant property owners tht have the preferred assets for
signal
 distribution.  For example, in my county, I am allowed free access
 to city
 infrastructure as a requirement that allowed tower building
 restrictions to
 be passed years ago. But yet I chose to pay for broadcast sites,
 because teh

 Governement do not own the best sites that are advantageous to me.

 Part of my point is that its not jsut the radios costs that are
 relevant.

 I'm starting to think that the Tropos, use all verticle, use only
one
 channel all across the network, design may not be to bad an ideas
 after all.
 If it solves the challenge to get mobility well, and does not work
 well for
 subs inside their homes, it still allows lots of spectrum for the
high
 quality Fixed Wireless providers.

 Part of the arguement is that its possible that MESH may be the
 only way to
 get mobilty well. And maybe the answer is to deliver it with the
 least
 impact on everyone else.

 Of course Alvarion mobile products have shown otherwise for
 vehichle mobile
 solutions.

 So what would happen if more Fixed Wireless manufacturers made
 Mobile CPEs?
 Would it get rid of some of teh need of mesh? Sure mesh gives
 person/laptop
 mobility, but will any one really use it?  There is a good
 arguement

Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-07-05 Thread Peter R.

More than 50 nodes per square mile.


-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Patrick Leary
Sent: Wednesday, July 05, 2006 12:25 PM
To: 'WISPA General List'
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale
Program

Earthlink primarily uses Tropos mesh, with about 40-50 nodes per square
mile
backhauled with Canopy 5GHz on about a 1:3 (mesh:Canopy) ratio. 

Patrick 
 


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Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-07-03 Thread Tom DeReggi

And what level of support do they include with that plan?
And how much do they pay, to get someone to help it work reliably? 
(engineered external antennas and such).

And how much do local ISP's pay, that want to share use of the WIFI network?
What value can the local ISP add, that will justify the consumer to pay a 
higher cost, or does the partner get a discounted price and more or less a 
reseller (a sales agent / marketing team, that does not get taxes taken out 
of paycheck :-)?


Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL  Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband


- Original Message - 
From: Peter R. [EMAIL PROTECTED]

To: WISPA General List wireless@wispa.org
Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 12:18 AM
Subject: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program



EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program
By Tara Seals
Posted on: 06/29/2006

EarthLink Inc. launched a municipal Wi-Fi broadband network in Anaheim,
Calif., and announced a wholesale Wi-Fi access strategy on Thursday.

EarthLink has won bids in several cities to provide citywide wireless
Internet access, including Philadelphia and San Francisco, but Anaheim
is its first commercial launch. It’s also the first piece of a strategy
to create a nationwide footprint of municipal Wi-Fi networks by tying
together all EarthLink municipal markets under one service.

Hand in hand with creating the footprint will be an open-access
wholesale program. The ISP already has two national wholesale partners,
announced today: PeoplePC Inc., EarthLink's wholly owned subsidiary, and
DIRECTV. It also plans to partner with local ISPs that want to provide
Wi-Fi service in their respective markets.

The portable, wireless service will provide high-speed Internet access
for residents, businesses, visitors and municipal employees. Anaheim’s
49-square-foot buildout is expected to be completed by the fourth
quarter. Curt Pringle, the mayor of the city, officially unwired the
city at a wire-cutting ceremony this morning.

“The days when Anaheim residents, workers and visitors are tied to a
desk to access an affordable broadband network are coming to an end,”
said Garry Betty, president and CEO of EarthLink. “The launch of this
network enables people to make a choice about how, and from where, they
want to access the Internet securely.”

For $21.95 a month, Anaheim subscribers receive eight mailboxes and
protection tools such as a spam blocker and security, and will be able
to access the Internet from across the municipality, whether sitting in
a park, at a café or elsewhere. Customers also can purchase a Wi-Fi
modem for at-home use. In addition, EarthLink has reached a nonbinding
agreement with AOL LLC and is discussing ways to offer its AOL.com
content and Web assets on the municipal footprint.

The network also will serve city departments and businesses; EarthLink’s
wireless network offers speeds comparable to existing T1 solutions, the
company says.

For occasional-use customers, EarthLink offers rates ranging from $3.95
for a one-hour pass to $15.95 for a three-day pass. Occasional-use
customers will connect and access account information from the EarthLink
portal page.

Consumers can visit www.EarthLink.net/wifi and provide their phone
numbers and addresses to see if the network has been built out in their
area. If unavailable, they will be added to a waiting list and will be
notified when the service is available.

As for infrastructure, EarthLink has deployed Tropos Networks’ MetroMesh
Wi-Fi routers on light poles throughout the city to form a wireless mesh
that is operated and optimized using Tropos Control and Tropos Insight,
a suite of end-to-end configuration, monitoring and maintenance tools.
EarthLink also uses Motorola’s MOTOwi4 portfolio of products, including
the Canopy high-speed backhaul and Wi-Fi mesh network equipment.


EarthLink Inc. Wi-Fi www.earthlink.net/wifi
Motorola Inc. www.motorola.com
Tropos Networks www.tropos.com

--


Regards,

Peter
RAD-INFO, Inc. - NSP Strategist
We Help ISPs Connect  Communicate
813.963.5884
http://4isps.com/newsletter.htm

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Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-07-03 Thread Tom DeReggi
The primary difference being that in the Canopy Fixed Wireless you are 
including end user CPE. The largest cost to detur take rate when WISPS make 
subs pay for it.


Its likely that one can assume that many of the subscribers will need to 
install outdoor equipment (adding $100-$300 BUCKS), to reliably connect to 
the mesh.  So you could easilly add $1.5 million to the mesh cost for CPE, 
or remove $1.5million from the Fix Wireless plan if you were going to 
compare apples to apples.


What Mesh still has on its side is mobility.  The question is what value 
should a WISP put on that. Mobility can be easilly be the reason to justify 
why a muni should support a oublic interest project. (cable and DSL go to 
the home but NOT mobile for teh community to share.).  Mobilty also allow 
Muni type applications, such as to support travelling users (commerce), or 
Mobile government work force.  Mesh also gives Muni bargining power in the 
deployment, as it uses an asset of value that the governement has to trade 
and offer (easements, light poles, and power from them).


In a Fixed Wireless deployment it could easilly be argued that teh 
givernemnt has little assets of value to the provider. Its usually the 
independant property owners tht have the preferred assets for signal 
distribution.  For example, in my county, I am allowed free access to city 
infrastructure as a requirement that allowed tower building restrictions to 
be passed years ago. But yet I chose to pay for broadcast sites, because teh 
Governement do not own the best sites that are advantageous to me.


Part of my point is that its not jsut the radios costs that are relevant.

I'm starting to think that the Tropos, use all verticle, use only one 
channel all across the network, design may not be to bad an ideas after all.
If it solves the challenge to get mobility well, and does not work well for 
subs inside their homes, it still allows lots of spectrum for the high 
quality Fixed Wireless providers.


Part of the arguement is that its possible that MESH may be the only way to 
get mobilty well. And maybe the answer is to deliver it with the least 
impact on everyone else.


Of course Alvarion mobile products have shown otherwise for vehichle mobile 
solutions.


So what would happen if more Fixed Wireless manufacturers made Mobile CPEs? 
Would it get rid of some of teh need of mesh? Sure mesh gives person/laptop 
mobility, but will any one really use it?  There is a good arguement that if 
usage of hotspots is low in public areas (parks, cafes, etc) it would be 
even lower on the streets and such.  There is still very little evidence 
that communities will get the MESH signal insidet heir home reliably without 
external CPE equipment.


Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL  Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband


- Original Message - 
From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED]

To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org
Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 1:43 PM
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program



a whole 49 square feet, eh ?  Real hard.  :)


Some interesting thoughts for Friday

I forget the exact numbers, but Tropos recommends something like 20 APs /
square mile to get 95% coverage at b/g rates

49 square miles = 49*20 ~ 960 Aps

Part# MTR-52103000-500AA is a 500 pack of HotZone Aps on their price sheet
that goes for about $1.5 million list
So that's $3 million in Aps -- for simplicity -- lets assume that mounting
hardware, power taps, etc is equal to the equivalent in discount
Then we need to add in the additional infrastructure, like backhaul SMs,
Routers, Servers, etc and the services required to install / implement the
system...

Experience from a similar type deployment (~40 square miles) pegs the entire
project at about $5 million for E,FI

Market Data:

Census information puts Anaheim w/ a population of 328k people (97k
households)
Median income for a household is $47k
According to the March 2006 PEW Internet report -- in 2006, 46% of the
population that makes between $30-75k / year have broadband at home
So the total addressable broadband market in Anaheim is 46k subscribers of
which 99% today are probably using some sort of landline cable / dsl
broadband solution that is bundled together w/ their TV/phone service

With a 10% penetration rate (that's ~5k subscribers) -- total revenue comes
out to about $110k / month

Assuming ZERO marketing, provisioning, customer service, bandwidth, support,
repair costs -- the breakeven point for this system is 5 years (ouch)

Lets look at fixed wireless

49 square miles is basically equivalent to a 4 mile ring around a tower
Remember

Area = (Pie)(R)^2
A = 3.14*4^2

A Canopy SM (averaged b/n 900  5 Ghz) costs about $300 complete (w/
antenna, mounting hardware, power supply, etc)
A Canopy AP costs about $2k complete (dividing up GPS sync, etc)

5k Canopy SMs would cost me about $1.5 million
The associated install costs (@ $50 / install) costs about $250k
At 50 SMs

RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-07-03 Thread Charles Wu
Hi Tom,

The WHOLE PURPOSE of a WiFi Mesh Network Strategy is to AVOID THE COST OF
THE CPE  TRUCK ROLL

Now -- whether this theory works in practice is a whole nother issue

-Charles

P.S. FWIW - personally, I find the the concept (from an ROI perspective) of
a service provider WiFi mesh to be a bit far-fetched, but then again, 10
years ago, I told the founder of half.com that you was bonkers, and proceded
to get into the wireless biz =/

---
CWLab
Technology Architects
http://www.cwlab.com 



-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Tom DeReggi
Sent: Monday, July 03, 2006 3:03 PM
To: WISPA General List
Subject: Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program


The primary difference being that in the Canopy Fixed Wireless you are 
including end user CPE. The largest cost to detur take rate when WISPS make 
subs pay for it.

Its likely that one can assume that many of the subscribers will need to 
install outdoor equipment (adding $100-$300 BUCKS), to reliably connect to 
the mesh.  So you could easilly add $1.5 million to the mesh cost for CPE, 
or remove $1.5million from the Fix Wireless plan if you were going to 
compare apples to apples.

What Mesh still has on its side is mobility.  The question is what value 
should a WISP put on that. Mobility can be easilly be the reason to justify 
why a muni should support a oublic interest project. (cable and DSL go to 
the home but NOT mobile for teh community to share.).  Mobilty also allow 
Muni type applications, such as to support travelling users (commerce), or 
Mobile government work force.  Mesh also gives Muni bargining power in the 
deployment, as it uses an asset of value that the governement has to trade 
and offer (easements, light poles, and power from them).

In a Fixed Wireless deployment it could easilly be argued that teh 
givernemnt has little assets of value to the provider. Its usually the 
independant property owners tht have the preferred assets for signal 
distribution.  For example, in my county, I am allowed free access to city 
infrastructure as a requirement that allowed tower building restrictions to 
be passed years ago. But yet I chose to pay for broadcast sites, because teh

Governement do not own the best sites that are advantageous to me.

Part of my point is that its not jsut the radios costs that are relevant.

I'm starting to think that the Tropos, use all verticle, use only one 
channel all across the network, design may not be to bad an ideas after all.
If it solves the challenge to get mobility well, and does not work well for 
subs inside their homes, it still allows lots of spectrum for the high 
quality Fixed Wireless providers.

Part of the arguement is that its possible that MESH may be the only way to 
get mobilty well. And maybe the answer is to deliver it with the least 
impact on everyone else.

Of course Alvarion mobile products have shown otherwise for vehichle mobile 
solutions.

So what would happen if more Fixed Wireless manufacturers made Mobile CPEs? 
Would it get rid of some of teh need of mesh? Sure mesh gives person/laptop 
mobility, but will any one really use it?  There is a good arguement that if

usage of hotspots is low in public areas (parks, cafes, etc) it would be 
even lower on the streets and such.  There is still very little evidence 
that communities will get the MESH signal insidet heir home reliably without

external CPE equipment.

Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL  Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband


- Original Message - 
From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org
Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 1:43 PM
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program


a whole 49 square feet, eh ?  Real hard.  :)

Some interesting thoughts for Friday

I forget the exact numbers, but Tropos recommends something like 20 APs /
square mile to get 95% coverage at b/g rates

49 square miles = 49*20 ~ 960 Aps

Part# MTR-52103000-500AA is a 500 pack of HotZone Aps on their price sheet
that goes for about $1.5 million list So that's $3 million in Aps -- for
simplicity -- lets assume that mounting hardware, power taps, etc is equal
to the equivalent in discount Then we need to add in the additional
infrastructure, like backhaul SMs, Routers, Servers, etc and the services
required to install / implement the system...

Experience from a similar type deployment (~40 square miles) pegs the entire
project at about $5 million for E,FI

Market Data:

Census information puts Anaheim w/ a population of 328k people (97k
households)
Median income for a household is $47k
According to the March 2006 PEW Internet report -- in 2006, 46% of the
population that makes between $30-75k / year have broadband at home So the
total addressable broadband market in Anaheim is 46k subscribers of which
99% today are probably using some sort of landline cable / dsl

Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-07-03 Thread Tom DeReggi
I had a quick interesting conversation with Mobile Pro at WCA. And he 
brought up a good point about, why should we discourage investment in this 
industry. I say, if someone thinks they can make mesh work, good for them, 
I'll even help them if I can to find ways for it to work better, as long as 
its done on their dollar. Who am I to critisize that Earthlink or anyone can 
or can't make it work. If they make it work, horray for us all, we can all 
follow step and install mesh networks ourselves, after letting them pay for 
all the RD to prove it can work.


But today... I bet my money on models that have proven to work. There is no 
evidence that Zero truck roll/ Zero CPE models will work reliably.  MESH for 
mobility (or I should say portabilty) on the other hand is clearly possibly, 
even advantageous with MESH.  So I do not care what the WHOLE PURPOSE  is, 
all I care about is what is the WHOLE REALITY.


Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL  Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband


- Original Message - 
From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED]

To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org
Sent: Monday, July 03, 2006 5:49 PM
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program


Hi Tom,

The WHOLE PURPOSE of a WiFi Mesh Network Strategy is to AVOID THE COST OF
THE CPE  TRUCK ROLL

Now -- whether this theory works in practice is a whole nother issue

-Charles

P.S. FWIW - personally, I find the the concept (from an ROI perspective) of
a service provider WiFi mesh to be a bit far-fetched, but then again, 10
years ago, I told the founder of half.com that you was bonkers, and proceded
to get into the wireless biz =/

---
CWLab
Technology Architects
http://www.cwlab.com



-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Tom DeReggi
Sent: Monday, July 03, 2006 3:03 PM
To: WISPA General List
Subject: Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program


The primary difference being that in the Canopy Fixed Wireless you are
including end user CPE. The largest cost to detur take rate when WISPS make
subs pay for it.

Its likely that one can assume that many of the subscribers will need to
install outdoor equipment (adding $100-$300 BUCKS), to reliably connect to
the mesh.  So you could easilly add $1.5 million to the mesh cost for CPE,
or remove $1.5million from the Fix Wireless plan if you were going to
compare apples to apples.

What Mesh still has on its side is mobility.  The question is what value
should a WISP put on that. Mobility can be easilly be the reason to justify
why a muni should support a oublic interest project. (cable and DSL go to
the home but NOT mobile for teh community to share.).  Mobilty also allow
Muni type applications, such as to support travelling users (commerce), or
Mobile government work force.  Mesh also gives Muni bargining power in the
deployment, as it uses an asset of value that the governement has to trade
and offer (easements, light poles, and power from them).

In a Fixed Wireless deployment it could easilly be argued that teh
givernemnt has little assets of value to the provider. Its usually the
independant property owners tht have the preferred assets for signal
distribution.  For example, in my county, I am allowed free access to city
infrastructure as a requirement that allowed tower building restrictions to
be passed years ago. But yet I chose to pay for broadcast sites, because teh

Governement do not own the best sites that are advantageous to me.

Part of my point is that its not jsut the radios costs that are relevant.

I'm starting to think that the Tropos, use all verticle, use only one
channel all across the network, design may not be to bad an ideas after all.
If it solves the challenge to get mobility well, and does not work well for
subs inside their homes, it still allows lots of spectrum for the high
quality Fixed Wireless providers.

Part of the arguement is that its possible that MESH may be the only way to
get mobilty well. And maybe the answer is to deliver it with the least
impact on everyone else.

Of course Alvarion mobile products have shown otherwise for vehichle mobile
solutions.

So what would happen if more Fixed Wireless manufacturers made Mobile CPEs?
Would it get rid of some of teh need of mesh? Sure mesh gives person/laptop
mobility, but will any one really use it?  There is a good arguement that if

usage of hotspots is low in public areas (parks, cafes, etc) it would be
even lower on the streets and such.  There is still very little evidence
that communities will get the MESH signal insidet heir home reliably without

external CPE equipment.

Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL  Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband


- Original Message - 
From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED]

To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org
Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 1:43 PM
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces

RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-07-03 Thread Jonathan Schmidt
Some of the support-free, subscription-free, cost-free models may work that
way in some sense.  That is, if you want to avail yourself of the free
cloud you need to get a savvy friend or employ a nerd-for-hire to get you
hooked up.  The provider simply inhales deeply, exhales the cloud, puts up
advertising and expects a peripheral-industry to be support-for-hire...and,
collects the ad revenue.

. . . j o n a t h a n

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Tom DeReggi
Sent: Monday, July 03, 2006 6:25 PM
To: WISPA General List
Subject: Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

I had a quick interesting conversation with Mobile Pro at WCA. And he 
brought up a good point about, why should we discourage investment in this 
industry. I say, if someone thinks they can make mesh work, good for them, 
I'll even help them if I can to find ways for it to work better, as long as 
its done on their dollar. Who am I to critisize that Earthlink or anyone can

or can't make it work. If they make it work, horray for us all, we can all 
follow step and install mesh networks ourselves, after letting them pay for 
all the RD to prove it can work.

But today... I bet my money on models that have proven to work. There is no 
evidence that Zero truck roll/ Zero CPE models will work reliably.  MESH for

mobility (or I should say portabilty) on the other hand is clearly possibly,

even advantageous with MESH.  So I do not care what the WHOLE PURPOSE  is,

all I care about is what is the WHOLE REALITY.

Tom DeReggi
RapidDSL  Wireless, Inc
IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband


- Original Message - 
From: Charles Wu [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: 'WISPA General List' wireless@wispa.org
Sent: Monday, July 03, 2006 5:49 PM
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program


Hi Tom,

The WHOLE PURPOSE of a WiFi Mesh Network Strategy is to AVOID THE COST OF
THE CPE  TRUCK ROLL

Now -- whether this theory works in practice is a whole nother issue

-Charles

P.S. FWIW - personally, I find the the concept (from an ROI perspective) of
a service provider WiFi mesh to be a bit far-fetched, but then again, 10
years ago, I told the founder of half.com that you was bonkers, and proceded
to get into the wireless biz =/

---
CWLab
Technology Architects
http://www.cwlab.com



-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Tom DeReggi
Sent: Monday, July 03, 2006 3:03 PM
To: WISPA General List
Subject: Re: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program


The primary difference being that in the Canopy Fixed Wireless you are
including end user CPE. The largest cost to detur take rate when WISPS make
subs pay for it.

Its likely that one can assume that many of the subscribers will need to
install outdoor equipment (adding $100-$300 BUCKS), to reliably connect to
the mesh.  So you could easilly add $1.5 million to the mesh cost for CPE,
or remove $1.5million from the Fix Wireless plan if you were going to
compare apples to apples.

What Mesh still has on its side is mobility.  The question is what value
should a WISP put on that. Mobility can be easilly be the reason to justify
why a muni should support a oublic interest project. (cable and DSL go to
the home but NOT mobile for teh community to share.).  Mobilty also allow
Muni type applications, such as to support travelling users (commerce), or
Mobile government work force.  Mesh also gives Muni bargining power in the
deployment, as it uses an asset of value that the governement has to trade
and offer (easements, light poles, and power from them).

In a Fixed Wireless deployment it could easilly be argued that teh
givernemnt has little assets of value to the provider. Its usually the
independant property owners tht have the preferred assets for signal
distribution.  For example, in my county, I am allowed free access to city
infrastructure as a requirement that allowed tower building restrictions to
be passed years ago. But yet I chose to pay for broadcast sites, because teh

Governement do not own the best sites that are advantageous to me.

Part of my point is that its not jsut the radios costs that are relevant.

I'm starting to think that the Tropos, use all verticle, use only one
channel all across the network, design may not be to bad an ideas after all.
If it solves the challenge to get mobility well, and does not work well for
subs inside their homes, it still allows lots of spectrum for the high
quality Fixed Wireless providers.

Part of the arguement is that its possible that MESH may be the only way to
get mobilty well. And maybe the answer is to deliver it with the least
impact on everyone else.

Of course Alvarion mobile products have shown otherwise for vehichle mobile
solutions.

So what would happen if more Fixed Wireless manufacturers made Mobile CPEs?
Would it get rid of some of teh

RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-06-30 Thread Rick Smith

a whole 49 square feet, eh ?  Real hard.  :) 

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Peter R.
Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 12:19 AM
To: WISPA General List
Subject: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program By Tara Seals Posted on: 
06/29/2006

EarthLink Inc. launched a municipal Wi-Fi broadband network in Anaheim, Calif., 
and announced a wholesale Wi-Fi access strategy on Thursday.

EarthLink has won bids in several cities to provide citywide wireless Internet 
access, including Philadelphia and San Francisco, but Anaheim is its first 
commercial launch. It's also the first piece of a strategy to create a 
nationwide footprint of municipal Wi-Fi networks by tying together all 
EarthLink municipal markets under one service.

Hand in hand with creating the footprint will be an open-access wholesale 
program. The ISP already has two national wholesale partners, announced today: 
PeoplePC Inc., EarthLink's wholly owned subsidiary, and DIRECTV. It also plans 
to partner with local ISPs that want to provide Wi-Fi service in their 
respective markets.

The portable, wireless service will provide high-speed Internet access for 
residents, businesses, visitors and municipal employees. Anaheim's 
49-square-foot buildout is expected to be completed by the fourth quarter. Curt 
Pringle, the mayor of the city, officially unwired the city at a wire-cutting 
ceremony this morning.

The days when Anaheim residents, workers and visitors are tied to a desk to 
access an affordable broadband network are coming to an end,
said Garry Betty, president and CEO of EarthLink. The launch of this network 
enables people to make a choice about how, and from where, they want to access 
the Internet securely.

For $21.95 a month, Anaheim subscribers receive eight mailboxes and protection 
tools such as a spam blocker and security, and will be able to access the 
Internet from across the municipality, whether sitting in a park, at a café or 
elsewhere. Customers also can purchase a Wi-Fi modem for at-home use. In 
addition, EarthLink has reached a nonbinding agreement with AOL LLC and is 
discussing ways to offer its AOL.com content and Web assets on the municipal 
footprint.

The network also will serve city departments and businesses; EarthLink's 
wireless network offers speeds comparable to existing T1 solutions, the company 
says.

For occasional-use customers, EarthLink offers rates ranging from $3.95 for a 
one-hour pass to $15.95 for a three-day pass. Occasional-use customers will 
connect and access account information from the EarthLink portal page.

Consumers can visit www.EarthLink.net/wifi and provide their phone numbers and 
addresses to see if the network has been built out in their area. If 
unavailable, they will be added to a waiting list and will be notified when the 
service is available.

As for infrastructure, EarthLink has deployed Tropos Networks' MetroMesh Wi-Fi 
routers on light poles throughout the city to form a wireless mesh that is 
operated and optimized using Tropos Control and Tropos Insight, a suite of 
end-to-end configuration, monitoring and maintenance tools.
EarthLink also uses Motorola's MOTOwi4 portfolio of products, including the 
Canopy high-speed backhaul and Wi-Fi mesh network equipment.


EarthLink Inc. Wi-Fi www.earthlink.net/wifi Motorola Inc. www.motorola.com 
Tropos Networks www.tropos.com

-- 


Regards,

Peter
RAD-INFO, Inc. - NSP Strategist
We Help ISPs Connect  Communicate
813.963.5884
http://4isps.com/newsletter.htm

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RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

2006-06-30 Thread Charles Wu
a whole 49 square feet, eh ?  Real hard.  :) 

Some interesting thoughts for Friday

I forget the exact numbers, but Tropos recommends something like 20 APs /
square mile to get 95% coverage at b/g rates

49 square miles = 49*20 ~ 960 Aps

Part# MTR-52103000-500AA is a 500 pack of HotZone Aps on their price sheet
that goes for about $1.5 million list 
So that's $3 million in Aps -- for simplicity -- lets assume that mounting
hardware, power taps, etc is equal to the equivalent in discount 
Then we need to add in the additional infrastructure, like backhaul SMs,
Routers, Servers, etc and the services required to install / implement the
system...

Experience from a similar type deployment (~40 square miles) pegs the entire
project at about $5 million for E,FI

Market Data:

Census information puts Anaheim w/ a population of 328k people (97k
households)
Median income for a household is $47k
According to the March 2006 PEW Internet report -- in 2006, 46% of the
population that makes between $30-75k / year have broadband at home
So the total addressable broadband market in Anaheim is 46k subscribers of
which 99% today are probably using some sort of landline cable / dsl
broadband solution that is bundled together w/ their TV/phone service

With a 10% penetration rate (that's ~5k subscribers) -- total revenue comes
out to about $110k / month

Assuming ZERO marketing, provisioning, customer service, bandwidth, support,
repair costs -- the breakeven point for this system is 5 years (ouch)

Lets look at fixed wireless

49 square miles is basically equivalent to a 4 mile ring around a tower 
Remember

Area = (Pie)(R)^2
A = 3.14*4^2

A Canopy SM (averaged b/n 900  5 Ghz) costs about $300 complete (w/
antenna, mounting hardware, power supply, etc)
A Canopy AP costs about $2k complete (dividing up GPS sync, etc)

5k Canopy SMs would cost me about $1.5 million
The associated install costs (@ $50 / install) costs about $250k
At 50 SMs / AP -- the AP costs runs around $250k
Infrastructure / Hardware / Switches / Site Ac / Engineering / etc would
cost about $100k (remember -- this is only a 4 mile radius =)

Interesting Thoughts:

Moto-Mesh System Cost to service 5k customers within 49 square miles: $5
million
Canopy Fixed Wireless System Cost to service 5k customers within 49 square
miles: $2.5 million

Hrm...

-Charles



---
CWLab
Technology Architects
http://www.cwlab.com 



-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Rick Smith
Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 6:46 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; WISPA General List
Subject: RE: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program




-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Peter R.
Sent: Friday, June 30, 2006 12:19 AM
To: WISPA General List
Subject: [WISPA] EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program

EarthLink Unwires Anaheim, Announces Wholesale Program By Tara Seals Posted
on: 06/29/2006

EarthLink Inc. launched a municipal Wi-Fi broadband network in Anaheim,
Calif., and announced a wholesale Wi-Fi access strategy on Thursday.

EarthLink has won bids in several cities to provide citywide wireless
Internet access, including Philadelphia and San Francisco, but Anaheim is
its first commercial launch. It's also the first piece of a strategy to
create a nationwide footprint of municipal Wi-Fi networks by tying together
all EarthLink municipal markets under one service.

Hand in hand with creating the footprint will be an open-access wholesale
program. The ISP already has two national wholesale partners, announced
today: PeoplePC Inc., EarthLink's wholly owned subsidiary, and DIRECTV. It
also plans to partner with local ISPs that want to provide Wi-Fi service in
their respective markets.

The portable, wireless service will provide high-speed Internet access for
residents, businesses, visitors and municipal employees. Anaheim's
49-square-foot buildout is expected to be completed by the fourth quarter.
Curt Pringle, the mayor of the city, officially unwired the city at a
wire-cutting ceremony this morning.

The days when Anaheim residents, workers and visitors are tied to a desk to
access an affordable broadband network are coming to an end, said Garry
Betty, president and CEO of EarthLink. The launch of this network enables
people to make a choice about how, and from where, they want to access the
Internet securely.

For $21.95 a month, Anaheim subscribers receive eight mailboxes and
protection tools such as a spam blocker and security, and will be able to
access the Internet from across the municipality, whether sitting in a park,
at a café or elsewhere. Customers also can purchase a Wi-Fi modem for
at-home use. In addition, EarthLink has reached a nonbinding agreement with
AOL LLC and is discussing ways to offer its AOL.com content and Web assets
on the municipal footprint.

The network also will serve city departments