Generally, we end up debating all day and all night on the lists of "what's the best radio" or "who's got those cool blue lights" -- however, FWIW, I've noticed that there seldom is any debate on "useful" topics like sales & marketing (especially of the product positioning of license-exempt wireless)
Do we call it wDSL? Wireless? More than Wifi? WiMAX? -- who knows? But fuel the fire with a few observations ----------------------------------------- <rant> ----------------------------------------- ARPU is an acronym for the Average Revenue per User. This is the average revenue factored across all customers as if each were charged the same price -- with some customers charged less and others more. Customer type usually determines price. In addition, a Network Operator's valuation is a direct multiple of its ARPU. The Marginal Recurring Cost (MRC) as compared to its Service Level / Marginal Recurring Revenue (MRR) of delivering the following license-exempt broadband wireless "WiMAX" connections have been calculated as follows: Broadband "Lite" Residential Service (512 / 512 Kb Burstable) MRR: $24.95 MRC: $20 Best Effort Residential Service (5 Mb / 512 Kb Burstable) MRR: $39.95 MRC: $20 Best Effort Business Class Service (5 Mb / 1 Mb Burstable) MRR: $149.95 MRC: $25 Dedicated Business Class Service (5 Mb / 3 Mb Burstable) (1 Mb / 1 Mb Dedicated) MRR: $249.95 MRC: $30 Dedicated Business SLA Service (5 Mb / 3 Mb Burstable) (3 Mb / 3 Mb Dedicated) MRR: $449.95 MRC: $40 Looking at the numbers, it's obvious that a higher ARPU increases the overall health of the bottom line. Interestingly enough, all the following service plans are achieved using the EXACT SAME license-exempt broadband wireless access technology. So why is the differentiating factor that allows some WISPs to sell that Canopy/Trango/Alvarion/whatever last mile connection for $300+ month ARPU while other can barely get $30 / month ARPU? IT'S OBVIOUSLY MORE THAN "JUST" TECHNOLOGY... ----------------------------------------- <rant> ----------------------------------------- -Charles -- WISPA Wireless List: wireless@wispa.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe: http://lists.wispa.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless Archives: http://lists.wispa.org/pipermail/wireless/