MuniWireless

Boingo Wireless has been awarded a patent covering the method and apparatus for accessing networks through a mobile device (patent No. 7,483,984). According to Boingo, the methods covered by the patent include “accessing wireless carrier networks by mobile computing devices, where a client software application hosted by the device accesses carrier networks using wireless access points. For example, when a computer – or netbook, smartphone or any other Wi-Fi-enabled device – is in a location where there are multiple signals,…

Boingo has just released its latest statistics concerning Wi-Fi use by mobile devices in Boingo hotspots. The numbers show a dramatic increase in the percentage of smartphone users on the Boingo network and in the amount of data transferred over the network. The company says that its subscribers are transferring an average of 114MB of data via Wi-Fi per month. Boingo Mobile customers now use Wi-Fi on average 12 times per month.

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AT&T sees massive increase in Wi-Fi connections (April 2009)

The…

Boingo has acquired Opti-Fi Networks, a company that manages Wi-Fi networks in 25 airports in North America. Boingo now has 55 airports in its roaming network which already includes John F. Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark airports in the NY area, as well as Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway, and London’s Heathrow.

Last week AT&T announced its acquisition of Wayport, which operates thousands of Wi-Fi hotspots in McDonalds and hotels. By adding thousands of hotspots to its network AT&T can provide free Wi-Fi…

Boingo has just added 500 Wi-Fi hotspots of Tata Communications to their global roaming network. According to the company, the aggregated network in India now includes popular locations such as Barista Coffee, Pizza Corner and Coffee World, Nokia Priority Centers and Nirula’s, as well as numerous hotels and airports (Chennai International Airport, Cochin International Airport, Goa International Airport, Hyderabad Rajiv Gandhi International Airport, Pune International Airport, and Sardar Vallabhbhai International Airport).

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Boingo adds Swisscom hotspots to their roaming network

The Cloud, a UK-based operator of Wi-Fi hotspots in Europe, has closed a €15 million round of financing from its current investors (Ferd Venture of Norway and GP Bullhound). The company will use the funds to expand its network of locations across Europe. At present, their hotspots are mostly in the UK, Germany, Sweden and Denmark, and they have partnerships with iPass (the Wi-Fi hotspot aggregator), O2, Orange and Vodafone.

Recently, BT announced the termination of its partnership with The Cloud…

One of the few pieces of good news this week (as I’m trying to avoid thinking about the meltdown in the financial markets): Boingo Wireless has added 1100 Swisscom hotspots in Switzerland to their network of roaming partners. Why is this such a big deal for me? Because Swisscom’s Wi-Fi hotspot service, not only in Switzerland but in other European countries, has always been very expensive (see my 2004 posts on Wi-Fi in Antwerp and Swisscom Eurospot not happy with Muniwireless).…