Doug, There are many cases like yours, that had shown to be successfull, selling at low margin. Its sounds like you've found a good way to do it.
However, as a note to others that are thinking to get into that segment of the market... There are a couple drawbacks... Often the support is needed at Night, not days. One must think whether they want to do a business giving support during that time. Sure it can be outsouces ($1.50 per sub?), but that takes a significant chunk out of the monthly if you are charging $5/sub, and it takes away your correspondance with the subscriber base, which can minimize value add up sell oportunities. The outsourced companies usually have protection to stop service or biill more for it, when exceeding a specified pre-agreed number of hours of support. Many building owners pick providers that give good support, because they don't want to hear the complaints themselves. I'm aware of one company that changed WISPs 7 times in 7 years, because each new provider got to many complaints from customers, because the outsourced supprot was not good enough. When the WISP gets fired in a year, they may have madfetheir money back for infrastructure, but they spend a lot of time with no profit in retur, when all said and done. Lastly, tenant buildings are known for AC power problems, and many infrastructure devices are in locations not accessible by end users, to check for power or reboot devices, which means truck rolls. When ever possible its a good option to work in to the agreement that the on duty building engineers will take responsibility to check equipment or reboot it, prior to a truck roll. Its also should be noted that vandalism can be high. I can;t count how many truck rolls we had because someone unplugged our gear, stole our Coax splitters (for their cable :-), even stole our access points for within their home. This means you need to think about mounting equipment in a secure manner, often will all components under lock and key, which again, can prevent ease to reboot equipment. Even if teh power coard is outside of the locked box, its just a matter of time before a maintenance man or cleaner unplugs it, to plug in their drill or vacume. I remember one case where an evicted tenant, picked the lock of the electrical room, set up his sleeping bag on the fllor, and unplugged our broadband, to plug in his TV and Music keyboard. :-) I guess what I'm saying is, its not all gravy. It requires a well thought out deployment, to make it profitable, if charging a low margin. My personally opinion, is not to go cheap, but to try and charge top dollar, and be prepared to give the support, and deploy repliably. Tom DeReggi RapidDSL & Wireless, Inc IntAirNet- Fixed Wireless Broadband ----- Original Message ----- From: "Doug Ratcliffe" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "WISPA General List" <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, June 24, 2008 12:18 PM Subject: Re: [WISPA] MSOs investing heavily in wi-fi rollouts > We've done a lot of condos. For free wifi, a 2.4 mesh network like > open-mesh covers most decent sized condos (~100 units) for less than a > grand. Then you can charge $5/unit, blow away the cable company and have > the thing paid back in 3 months. > > We also install pay on demand which has had moderate success - a 120 unit > apartment condo building, $9.95/wk, $19.95/month, we get about 10-15 > signups > a month and Meraki sends us a check minus their fee. Still takes a year > or > so to pay it back but its really been a zero maintenance building minus > the > occasional person who can't get their wifi working at first. > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Rogelio" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: "WISPA General List" <[email protected]> > Sent: Tuesday, June 24, 2008 12:25 PM > Subject: [WISPA] MSOs investing heavily in wi-fi rollouts > > >> One trend I'm seeing is for cable companies to purchase a ubiquitous >> wifi infrastructure in new areas. >> >> These numbers aren't too far off from some numbers I saw yesterday: >> >> --$50K to put in ubiquitous wifi for a time share condo (retail is way >> more, like $70K; but MSOs get discounts) >> --$20/mo for each unit >> --$20/mo * 100 units * 12 months = $24,000/year in revenue the cable >> cable company can ear >> >> => paid off equipment in approx two years >> >> Anyone else seeing those numbers / trends? >> >> In fact, it seems as if bringing cable companies into the deals has been >> a sure way to close these large purchases in some cases. >> >> >> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- >> WISPA Wants You! 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