SmartBridges introduces a sub-$400 customer-premises outdoor generic Wi-Fi bridge: we'll be hearing a lot about this device as it meets virtually all of the needs of wireless ISPs as they attempt to inexpensively serve their customers from a few hundred feet to tens of miles away. It's a device intended to be placed at a customer's location (CPE or customer premises equipment), and it's ruggedized for outdoor performance in sub-zero to supra-100 temperatures at claimed distances of up to 21 miles line-of-sight.
It uses Power over Ethernet (PoE) and includes a 50-foot PoE cable. This eliminates an electrician's involvement in a customer install. The company's press release says they are certifying the device with many standard antennas, allowing FCC-legal deployment. (The FCC only certifies antennas with specific access points as complete systems. [Thanks to Tim Pozar and Jim Thompson for that education.])
The bridge works with any Wi-Fi access point, much like the 3Com Wireless Workgroup Bridge. Because of all of these factors, including its expected $379 list price, it's likely we'll see quite a lot of near-term testing of this equipment and, if it works as advertised, substantial use.
There is nothing like this on the market that works generically with any compliant Wi-Fi access point. The closest equipment requires specific vendor access points, like those available from Cisco, Alvarion, 3Com and others; they also typically cost substantially more.
If this device pans out, it is likely the first entry in a maturing but relatively unknown market (in the wider world) that companies like Musenki are already dedicated to serving, and for which EtherLinx was founded as well.
Hardware Roaming Isn't the Same as Single Billing
More excellent blogging from the 802.11 Planet conference in Philly: Alan Reiter notes that Stephanie Kesler blogged the panel he was moderating. (In more Ouroboros news, Alan discovered Stephanie's blog through this blog.) Here's Internetnews.com's coverage.
Stephanie notes that T-Mobile, in the Q and A portion, said that roaming wasn't needed. Her paraphrase of their response: there is not a compelling need for true roaming because the spectrum is unlicensed and their network is easily accessible.
This is what MobileStar used to think, too, before they went bankrupt and T-Mobile/Deutsche Telecom acquired their assets. The T-Mobile folks believe that because they have Starbucks as their anchor partner with a multi-year exclusive arrangement, they will be able to set the tone and terms of roaming.
The market already belies this in several ways. First, Starbucks aren't uniformly distributed. Second, there will be signal competition at the most densely used Starbucks (part of Surf and Sip's original model), meaning that you won't have to sign onto T-Mobile even inside their "exclusive" venues. Third, the market will just be too big. So what if they have 3,000 Starbucks in 18 months all set to go if there are 25,000 access points overall? Their customers will demand roaming or find other venues and providers that do.
T-Mobile wisely points out that there's no barrier to switching at the hardware level, and this will enable the smartest, largest footprint, best organized provider or network partner to providers to be the most successful. MobileStar pursued one-year lock-in through their monthly plans; you had to pay a penalty to exit before a year was up. This might work in the cell world, but the best customers, travelling businesspeople, will migrate to the best service for the buck and mile.
Other News
An excellent run-down on the SF Bay community networking efforts: the San Francisco Bay Guardian writer captures the real feel of what's going on down there, or at least it matches my filter on the world.