July 26, 2007 at 2:34 PM by
Esme Vos
A new report from London-based market analysts Datamonitor says the market for muni wireless is “positioned to explode” in the UK and the US over the next five years, growing from $900 million this year to $6.4 billion in 2012.A new report from London-based market analysts Datamonitor says the market for muni wireless is “positioned to explode” in the UK and the US over the next five years, growing from $900 million this year to $6.4 billion in 2012 as local governments and internet service providers recognize the economic and community benefits these networks offer.”
The report, “The Future of Municipal Wireless Networks,” summarizes trends driving the muni market and predicts a big spurt in the coming year as the market grows to $900 million in the U.S. and to$47.5 million in the UK.
According to Datamonitor’s press release:
Municipal wireless is still in the embryonic stages of development. However a report by independent market analyst Datamonitor says the trend is positioned to explode in the UK and the US over the next five years as local governments and internet service providers recognize the economic and community benefits these networks offer. Such benefits of municipal wireless networks include making free broadband wireless Internet access available to mobile professionals/citizens, on-the-spot police and fire department access to time sensitive information, lower communication costs for government agencies and improved reputations as “cutting edge” cities. According to the report ” The Future of Municipal Wireless Networks,” spend in the US and UK will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 48% from $900 million in 2007 to $6.4 billion in 2012.
“Faced with strained budget resources, waning workforces, demand for more personalized constituents service and greater threats to public safety, local governments are looking for new ways to increase efficiency while also providing more and better services, says Kate McCurdy, Datamonitor’s Government Technology Analyst and author of the report. “An innovative solution to this challenge is “municipal’ wireless networks. By deploying wireless networks from street lights and lamp posts around a community, local governments provide citizens, businesses and public employees with low-cost ‚Äö?Ñ?¨ or even free – ubiquitous internet connectivity while outdoors.”
Silicon.com offers a close look at trends identified in this report and cites our own data on the muni market.
Click here for a thumbnail look at the report.
Related posts:
- 2007 MuniWireless State of the Market Report
- Voice over Wi-Fi equipment revenues to reach $82 billion by 2012
- Muni wireless market could top $10 billion by 2011
Loading ...
I would like to register my belief that the muni-wireless market will fail to develop as predicted in this story. I believe the inherent limits of today’s technology preclude the success of ANY municipal wireless network.
Perhaps when the 700MHz spectrum is made available, some success may follow, but then only if the allowed power limits are raised.
As a provider of WiFi in RV parks, really little municipalities, I can attest to the presence of real technological hurdles which will absolutely make it impossible to meet the goals espoused in this article, to wit “local governments provide citizens, businesses and public employees with low-cost or even free ubiquitous internet connectivity while outdoors.”
First among this is the limited range of today’s wireless gear. To say that your average wireless laptop has a range of 300feet is optimistic, but even using that figure as a guide to a successful muni-wifi deployment makes it necessary to pincushion the municipalities with towers to provide adequate coverage. This is a function of the low power requirements and the fact that 2.4GHZ and 5.7GHZ signals do not penetrate building materials well.
Even supposing the ability to acquire and deploy that density of access points, and leaving out the inherent problems of interference from adjacent APs, you are still left with the need to provide backhaul to each site. The best option for this is to wire each AP to the Internet, which is sometimes feasible, but expensive, and requires a new wired network of some complexity and size. That option is usually relegated to the wishlist of frustrated RF engineers, while the mesh idea is promoted.
There is no wireless mesh technology which works at scale. There is only so much spectrum, and it is unprotected, which means that you cannot scale without increasing noise, and you have no recourse against any existing noise. I’ve been doing wireless networks for years in extremely rural (jungles of Laos) and extremely metropolitan (Manhattan) areas, and the noise floor gets louder each year. Imagine the noise created by a whole metropolis being online!
And yet that’s the stated goal, to increase load, in the form of new, previously “underserved” users. Existing EVDO technologies, actually deployed and earning profit, provide a substantial fraction of WiFi’s promised bandwidth, and much longer range. Bandwidth requirements of users are sure to grow exponentially with wireless video applications.
WiFi, any 802.x flavor, is destined to fail to meet any reasonable performance metric, and the absence of any functioning metro-wireless network in the world should be proof enough that the hype is leading reality, and a comeuppance is in order.
Say no to municipal wireless until technology changes, then at least wait for a single successful venture before spending our money on pie-in-the-sky dreams.
Sincerely,
Mike Burns
I would very much like to hear the views of Mike Burns about municipality-owned or co-owned mobile WiMax systems or other technologies that can provide mobile-Internet services to local or regional residents.