Benedict,
Your first couple of questions are good ones. Please see the reference
sites that I've provided in previous posts to the list for the answers to
those questions.
I fear the rest of your post is a result of linear thinking. Your convinced
that 3G is the solution, because you have believe it until now. Your not
really taking the time to investigate and consider the alternatives. We
live in a complex environment and it's likely that a number of wireless
solutions will exist for different aspects of our environment. The one
clear impact that Wi-Fi has already had on 3G worldwide is in investment.
It was thought only a couple of years ago that the business market would
belong to operators. That compelling applications would be funded and
built. Wi-Fi and it's associated startups have disrupted the flow of
capital and that is clearly a disruptive and competitive issue for 3G
service providers and application developers.
Wi-Fi has momentum and to simply deny it's capabilities, competitive
advantages, and rapid growth won't make it go away.
Realistically, the speeds to expect from Wi-Fi currently are in the 6 to 10
MB range and that increases significantly with 802.11a and 802.11g. The
user experience of using the same applications one uses on wireline networks
with the same expectation of broadband throughput isn't insignificant to the
end user.
As for the voice impact of Wi-Fi, I believe that the operators who want to
offer "push-to-talk" to enterprises may well feel the sting of competition.
I don't see Wi-Fi replacing voice communications of the cellular/PCS
operators. The battle is laid out for data communications.
I'm not unaccustomed to being in a minority opinion position. I predicted
that Palm and Handspring would become one company a year ago. Many people
disagreed with me then.
...Debi
----- Original Message -----
From: "Benedict Evans" <ben@ben-evans.com>
To: <keitai-l@appelsiini.net>
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2003 2:31 AM
Subject: (keitai-l) Re: Forrester: WI-FI is going to crash
>
> I think there are two separate questions here:
>
> *What can WiFi really do over wide areas without putting a base station
> ever few hundred yards?
>
> *Would consumers use wifi for anything other than the laptop
> connectivity ghetto? If not, all due respect, but who cares?
>
> The second question depends partly, but only partly, on the first. I can
> get 64-384Kbits/sec in around 50% of the UK TODAY, with Hutchison's '3'
> product. That will get better, and wifi will never come close in terms
> of coverage. So:
>
> Under what circumstances will the speed advantage (realistically, wifi
> might offer up to twice the speed of 3G where available) and cost
> advantage (if any) cause people to use wifi instead of 3G for anything
> other than a laptop?
>
> It seems to me self-evident that wifi cannot compete with cellular for
> voice. PHS, a comprehensive, integrated cordless system, has only 5M
> subscribers, compared with over 50m cellular subscribers. No wifi voice
> offering would be anything like as good as PHS.
>
> -Benedict
Received on Thu Jun 26 00:53:07 2003