It’s clear that the proliferation of smartphones, streaming data and other high-bandwidth applications have far surpassed the ability of 3G networks to handle the load. Moreover, the mobility horse has left the proverbial barn. So, as much as the market looks to fiber, that won’t help when you’re standing with your Smartphone in Times Square streaming a restaurant review. The choice, especially in high density cities like New York and San Francisco, is managed Wi-Fi networks into apartment buildings and Hotspots to offload the 3G traffic. It’s proven technology and it’s here.

The reality is that customers will continue to clamor for unlimited plans and will gravitate towards carriers that provide that. In addition, the carriers (including Verizon) have all come full circle on Wi-Fi, and now see it as an ally to help offload traffic – especially in high density cities like San Francisco and New York.  Wi-Fi has become the “Windows” of the wireless world: it’s being used by everybody, it’s unlikely to be replaced by any other technology in the near terms and it’s probably here to stay (at least over the next 5 to 10 years).

See the Story on Pronto Networks’ website:

http://www.prontonetworks.com/index.php/component/content/article/165.

It highlights the problem a San Francisco apartment owner was having getting Wi-Fi to work in an older building. From our perspective, it validates the fact that every building is not the same and thus there isn’t one approach that works in all cases. We’ve run into too many cases where a local vendor who’s familiar with Brand x technology uses that to provide Wi-Fi in an apartment complex when it’s the absolute wrong approach for that building. As they say, caveat emptor!