It all comes down to a simple economics in the end. Who can most cost effectively provide broadband. At the end of the day when a WISP puts up a 'cell' site it is probably costing them 1/100th of what it costs the cellco to do so. The equipment used is most likely 1/100th the cost at the 'AP' and 1/10th at the CPE and the spectrum that the cellco uses is not free.
Even when you take into account that the cellco operates on a much longer ROI and they can get some economy of scale on certain things I don't see how they can overcome the price difference to be able to effectively compete against a WISP, especially given their lack of spectrum. Sure you get a much better noise floor, but they have fewer channels to deal with. And from a cost perspective it is a lot harder to justify putting up micropops as a cellco. I know plenty of WISPs that can afford to put a micro-pop up for 3 customers. I do see how a cellco could afford to do that for eveny 20 times that number. Deep pockets only last so long when you are losing money. On 10/26/11 11:07 AM, Fred Goldstein wrote: > At 10/26/2011 11:42 AM, Chuck Hogg wrote: >> The "LIVE" network here does 26Mb x 22Mb with<70ms latency. > The VZW network isn't such bad competition for a WISP for two reasons. > > One -- those numbers you see are on the brand-new, unloaded > network. The've just started selling LTE gear this year, so the > cells are nowhere near full capacity. As they get busier, average > capacity per subscriber will go down, especially during busy > hours. At some point they will add cells, but I'm suspecting it's at > a much lower performance point than you're seeing now. > > Two -- their per-cell costs are much higher, and thus they have to > charge more for bulk usage. They have caps on their plans, and > additional usage is very costly. So while LTE is okay for the > vacation traveler looking to check email and read a few favorite web > sites, or the light home user, it's not going to appeal to even > moderate users. Even Sprint is starting to cap its plans, after > running a huge "unlimited" (uh, for the rest of the month?) > advertising campaign. > > > -- > Fred Goldstein k1io fgoldstein "at" ionary.com > ionary Consulting http://www.ionary.com/ > +1 617 795 2701 > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > WISPA Wants You! Join today! > http://signup.wispa.org/ > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > > WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org > > Subscribe/Unsubscribe: > http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless > > Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WISPA Wants You! Join today! http://signup.wispa.org/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/
