Alvarion: Real World Models in the Commons

They're not giving us a moment's rest at the SpectrumFest -- over lunch, we're hearing three vendor presentations from people who are making innovative use of spectrum.

Patrick Leary is chief evangelist of Alvarion, an agressively gentile title that's problematic for the HQ in Tel Aviv (he's presenting on Saturday, which makes him Alvarion's Shabbos Goy, I suppose).

Alvarion has 50% of the global market share for fixed wireless broadband services. Here are three of its customers:

Widwest Wireless (commercial business). 300,000 cellular subscribers in a "property model" -- they bought a license to spectrum. They've setup a subsidiary, ClearWave to handle the wireless. Covers 54 communities in 137 townships in Minnesota. 50 wireless broadband sites using 2.4GHz, usie 5GHz for backhaul. 1,200 customers in first month. Serving towns with as few as 270 people. It costs about $700 to connect a new customer, and the monthly cost for wireline and wireless backhaul runs about $14,500. Installing a new cel costs $2-$6K -- each tower runs about 180 customers. Towers run atop water-towers or piggyback on their cellular towers. Towers are profitable about 18 months after going up.

Owensboro Municipal Utility (publicly owned nonprofit). Serve a market with cable, DSL, and fixed-wireless competition. For rural communities to remain economically viable, they must have broadband. Hence a nonprofit with very low rates. Largest municipal utility in Kentucky. Operating in heavily forested, hill country. Installation is free, residential serivce is $25/month (512k down/128k up).

City of Pratt, Kansas Police Dept (civil public safety operator). Intention is to connect to departmental LANs from vehicles (how do you update the virus definitions in a cop car's PC?) and to replace cellphone with VoIP. 60 sqmi coverage. Gaining 2h productivity/officer/day -- saving $21k/month. Discuss