INTERNET SERVICE BUSINESS
Back in the 1970’s and 1980’s when someone needed to remotely access computers from home there was very little choice. Either your computer had its own dial-in modems or it was hooked into a service that provided dial-in modem service like Tymenet or Telenet and you used a terminal to do your work at between 110 and 1200 baud or 10 – 120 characters per second. Yes, if you were a fast reader you could read faster than your terminal could spit out data to the screen, but times they were changing.
In the late 1980’s or the age of dial-up, modem speeds increased dramatically, eventually toping 56K baud and there were more dial-up services than you could shake a stick at. The big ones CompuServe, DowJones, Prodigy and AOL still have their legacy, but there were thousands that each had their own following. Add to that hundreds of thousands of BulletinBoardSystems and you get the picture the landscape that the Internet emerged into.
Eventually through the 1990’s the online services became Internet Service Providers or faded away and the BBS became websites and later blogs. The problem was speed; Dial-up was at its physical limits. Enter Broadband, broadband represents a collection of technologies that bypass the analog world of modems and send and receive true digital signals utilizing network protocols. This allows computers to communicate 10-100 times faster in a similar environment. The Phone companies developed ISDN and DSL and the CaTV companies developed their flavor of broadband.
This has led us to today’s stagnant marketplace for broadband internet access. In most markets your only choices are ILECs, CLECs, CaTV and Satellite. Gone are the thousands or hundreds or even dozens of choices.
In 2009 the US Government officially switched us over from analog to digital television. This switch freed up a huge number of frequencies that have become available for wireless broadband. Unfortunately the companies that have bought them are either those same broadband providers or companies that are doing business just either them or cell phone companies.
This has left a huge GAP that can be filled by companies using a different approach.
COMPETITION AND BUYING PATTERNS
THE OLD WAY
The old model of internet access was developed by the LEC marketplace and strongly resembles a metered utility just like old fashioned local phone service. When other players such as CaTV and Satellite entered into the internet market they kept the same model of providing service. In this model each subscriber is responsible for his or her own relationship with their internet carrier and is at the mercy of the market which despite the fact that it is growing the competition is shrinking and the prices are rising. Fixed Wireless service takes this same utility model and integrates wireless technology.
MAN MODEL
A new community based model is emerging across the country one based on the community coming together and forming Municipal Area Networks. These MANs are being built by downtown districts, housing developments and even entire towns. They allow large groups of people to collectively purchase internet capacity and negotiate better pricing.
Coupled with the move to a community model is the move to wireless. Wireless delivery of internet service is a natural fit to the MAN model since they are both geographically constrained and are essentially localized services. A key technological factor in the wireless arena that makes pure wireless deliver possible is the advent of mesh wireless equipment. In a mesh the equipment automatically routes around malfunctioning nodes in a seamless transparent fashion. This improves the reliability of pure wireless solutions to competitive with wired access points.
MAN BETTER FIT FOR COMMUNITIES
The (2) wireless models offer a choice of business as usual or moving towards a community based model. We have put together MANGONET to:
- Save people money,
- Generate revenue for the Communities and
- Make money while doing this.