Next Generation Hotspot (NGH) Wi-Fi technology will account for $150 billion in operator revenue by 2018, the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) said Friday in a report. The report, done with research firm Senza Fili, said the technology has advanced as a result of advanced trials involving major operators and vendors. The additional interest “will ultimately give users easier access to a far greater number of public Wi-Fi access points around the world, without the need for usernames and passwords,” WBA said in a news release. The increased need for additional Wi-Fi capacity to address mobile data usage issues has resulted in a move away from legacy hotspot Wi-Fi technology and toward NGH, WBA said. A higher proportion of data traffic carried over HG Wi-Fi results in reduced per-bit costs, with carriers reporting their per-bit RAN costs reduced by 18 percent when they use NGH to carry 20 percent of their data traffic, the report said. The per-bit cost of a network that uses NGH Wi-Fi and 4G small cells could be as low as 38 percent of the cost of a 3G macro network, WBA said in the report (http://bit.ly/14Ni8CA).
Sprint still expects to have the first phase of its Network Vision network upgrade plan “largely complete” by the middle of 2014, Wells Fargo analyst Davis Hebert said Tuesday in a note to investors. Hebert was among the Wells Fargo staff and investors that met with Sprint CEO Dan Hesse, Chief Financial Officer Joe Eutenauer and other Sprint executives Tuesday. Network Vision’s first phase involves an enhanced 3G and LTE overlay at Sprint’s 38,000 cell sites, as well as the now-completed shutdown of the old Nextel iDEN network. The carrier expects its LTE network to cover an area containing a potential 200 million customers by the end of the year, Hebert said. Network Vision’s second phase -- the incorporation of the 2.5 GHz spectrum Sprint acquired in its buyout of Clearwire -- “has yet to begin,” Hebert said. Sprint expects to reveal more details about incorporation of this spectrum “at some point in the not-too-distant future,” he said.
Seventy-four percent of U.S. mothers play videogames, according to findings of a survey released Tuesday by the Entertainment Software Association. ESA said that among the moms who play videogames, 75 percent do so on a weekly basis and 38 percent play daily. While they play on a variety of platforms, smartphones and other mobile devices are the most popular among the demographic, with 65 percent of moms using them for game play, it said. Other findings: Thirty percent of mom gamers with kids 5-12 said videogames helped them connect with their kids; 32 percent of them believed videogames helped them improve their cognitive skills; and 71 percent of them said they closely monitored videogame content for their kids. NPD conducted the survey for ESA among a U.S. representative sample of about 2,500 adult females with kids under the age of 18 in the household, said ESA. Respondents who qualified as mom gamers said they played videogames on at least one system or device, including a smartphone, videogame console, portable game console or computer, it said.
ViaSat’s penetration of a new VoIP service among its satellite-based broadband subscribers could eventually approach 20 percent, nearly matching the rates of other providers, said CEO Mark Dankberg on a conference call. ViaSat’s Exede satellite-based broadband subscribers could eventually also be buying the company’s new Exede Voice service that launched in June (CD June 17 p22), he said. ViaSat shipped an adapter that connects the satellite modem with the VoIP service. While the number of VoIP subscribers at the end of fiscal Q1 was “pretty small,” the addition of the service will benefit ViaSat’s average revenue per user for broadband, Dankberg said. ViaSat’s Exede ARPU in fiscal Q1 was $50.50, said Stephens analyst Tim Quillin. The addition of VoIP came as ViaSat continued to expand its Exede broadband service, which added a net 38,000 subscribers to end fiscal Q1 with 550,000 customers, Dankberg said. The net was below Quillin’s forecast for 40,000. Exede’s monthly churn was 2.5 percent, Dankberg said. The bulk of Exede subscribers get the 12 Mbps/3 Mbps download/upload service that starts with a $49 monthly fee and 12 GB usage cap, company executives have said. Exede customers get service from ViaSat-1 at 115 degrees west as well as WildBlue-1 and Telesat Canada’s Anik F2 satellites. As of the end of the fiscal Q1 on June 28, 362,000 customers were getting broadband service from ViaSat-1, up from 297,000 in March, company executives said. The migration of subscribers from WildBlue-1 and Anik F2 satellites to ViaSat-1 slowed in fiscal Q1 to 5,000 to 6,000 customers, said Chief Accounting Officer Shawn Lynn Duffy. The migration had been running at 30,000 to 35,000 per quarter, company executives have said. Most customers on ViaSat-1 are Exede subscribers. Some DirecTV subscribers, who get the Exede service as part of a bundling deal that pairs it with DirecTV video, also get programming from ViaSat-1, executives of ViaSat have said. “It looks like demand is greater than supply” for ViaSat-1, and that “we can anticipate continued good subscriber demand,” Dankberg said. ViaSat fiscal Q1 capital expenses grew $44 million from a year ago due largely to the start of development of the ViaSat-2 satellite that’s expected to launch in 2016. The Boeing-built ViaSat-2 will have double the capacity and a coverage area that includes the Atlantic Ocean between North America and Europe as well as parts of the Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico and northern South America, ViaSat executives have said. Some of ViaSat-2 capabilities could come to market sooner than the satellite itself, Dankberg said. ViaSat signed a $358 million purchase agreement for ViaSat-2 with Boeing in May. The total cost of ViaSat-2, including satellite, launch, insurance and gateway equipment is expected to be $600 million to $650 million, the company said. ViaSat also expects to start the Federal Aviation Administration certification process this month for its Exede in the Air broadband service for Boeing 737 airplanes. It gained FAA flightworthiness certification with JetBlue for Airbus A320 airplanes following tests in July, but is still awaiting final approval before entering commercial service, Dankberg said. Boeing also is working to have the Exede service available as an option with Boeing aircraft starting in 2015, Boeing has said. ViaSat, working with Live TV on the JetBlue service, had hoped to introduce it on 1-2 planes by mid-year. ViaSat’s fiscal Q1 net loss narrowed to $1.4 million from $14.4 million a year ago as revenue jumped to $321.1 million from $241.7 million. Product sales increased to $182.1 million from $147.7 million, while those from services rose to $138.9 million from $94 million, the company said. ViaSat’s satellite services revenue, including Exede, increased to $85.8 million from $58.7 million. ViaSat’s earnings benefited from a $1.4 million decline in interest expense to $10.1 million as a result of its refinancing $275 million in 8 7/8 percent notes due 2016 at lower rates in October, Duffy said. The notes were refinanced with the proceeds from the issuing of $300 million in notes due 2020, the company said.
The SEC cleared IDT to spin off its Straight Path Communications subsidiary, IDT said Monday. Straight Path Communications has extensive holdings of spectrum licenses in the 28 and 38 GHz bands, as well as patents relating to the Internet and other communications over computer networks, IDT said. Following the spinoff, Straight Path Communications’ management will be “dedicated to realizing value from these intangible assets,” IDT said. The spinoff will be effective at 11:59 p.m. EDT on July 31 (http://bit.ly/1dCOU81).
Forty-five percent of European households would upgrade their Internet subscription or switch to a new ISP to get higher broadband speeds, the European Commission said Monday. Competition has made affordable prices available, but more attention is needed to ensure that demands for higher speeds are met, it said. The Eurobarometer survey also found that 54 percent of homes limit their national and international mobile calls because of cost concerns, the EC said. This isn’t acceptable in the smartphone era, where high quality mobile services are an essential part of daily life, said Digital Agenda Commissioner Neelie Kroes. However, the survey also found a sharp drop in the number of people worried about the cost of calls to networks other than their own domestic providers, a “clear sign” that EC efforts to cut mobile termination rates are working for consumers. The survey also found, among other things, that: (1) Around 40 percent of European users have found it difficult to access online content and apps because of insufficient speed or download capacity. (2) Sound quality is a concern, with only 38 percent of respondents saying sound is very good on their mobile phones, compared with 49 percent for landline phones and 25 percent for Internet calls. (3) Video blocks are the most annoying net neutrality/copyright issue. (4) Forty-four percent of households have at least one mobile Internet subscription, up from 30 percent in 2012. The e-communications household survey, completed in March, interviewed nearly 28,000 respondents face-to-face at home across Europe, the EC said.
Texas is devoting this week to digital literacy skills, local computing centers and how to connect residents with affordable broadband options. The Texas State Library and Archives Commission and the Texas Connects Coalition have taken charge of what is the second Broadband Across Texas week, said the Texas State Library and Archives Commission Monday (http://bit.ly/136Goz6). “Libraries are on the front lines of digital inclusion and digital literacy efforts,” the commission said. “Nearly every Texas library offers free access to computers and the internet, and increasingly they are also providing computer classes, one-on-one help with email, and e-reader/gadget assistance.” The commission also spotlighted the 38 Texas libraries taking part in the Technology, Expertise, Access and Learning for all Texans, funded by federal stimulus dollars to help close the digital divide. This week, organizers will hold events in Austin, Houston and San Antonio as well as throughout rural Texas, with computer centers holding courses on digital skills, said the commission.
Sprint Nextel’s Boost Mobile will add its fourth LTE-equipped smartphone this year, launching LG’s Optimus F7 on Thursday without a contract at $299. The Android 4.1-based Optimus F7 has a 4.7-inch LCD, 1.5 GHz processor and eight-megapixel camera. It adds to Boost’s lineup of LTE-based models as Sprint sharpens the focus of its prepaid business on smartphones, which accounted for 75 percent of that segment’s Q1 sales, Sprint executives have said. Boost previously offered 4G WiMAX models, the last of which was introduced on Clearwire’s network 18 months ago, a Sprint spokeswoman said Thursday. The push in prepaid comes as Sprint continues to expand its Network Vision LTE rollout, having 13,500 cell sites at the end of Q1 and a goal of reaching most of the 38,000 it has plans for by year-end. Sprint’s LTE service is in 110 U.S. markets, up from 88 in March. Sprint remains on schedule to shut down Nextel’s former network by June 30, having only a “small amount” of subscribers remaining on it, the spokeswoman said. Sprint had 1.3 million subscribers on the Nextel network in March, having converted 264,000 to its postpaid service in Q1, the company has said. Boost, which targets customers focused on voice and text services, and Virgin Mobile, which is targeted for data, had 15.68 million customers March 31, up from 14.96 million a year earlier, Sprint has said. The prepaid business had a decline in average revenue per user to $26.08 from $26.82 a year ago, while monthly churn dropped to 3.26 percent from 3.62 percent, the company has said. Prepaid revenue improved to $1.22 billion in Q1 from $1.2 billion a year earlier, Sprint has said. Sprint remains poised to introduce BlackBerry’s keyboard-equipped Q10 this summer, the company spokeswoman said Thursday, declining comment on the exact date. Sprint was among the few U.S. carriers that didn’t offer BlackBerry’s touch-based Z10 when it was introduced earlier this year.
Maintaining DirecTV’s relationships with telecom partners instead of entering into the wireless business is in the best interest of the DBS company’s shareholders, said CEO Mike White. There’s no question that consumers’ use of mobile video will continue to expand significantly, he said Tuesday on an earnings call.
CiG Wireless said it agreed to buy 290 tower sites from Liberty Towers for more than $33.2 million in cash and CiG shares. The deal -- anticipated to close on June 30 -- would give CiG Wireless 38 tower sites that are already built and generating revenue, as well as 252 work-in-progress sites. The purchase will “significantly expand our tower footprint as well as provide us with excellent future development opportunities,” said CiG CEO Paul McGinn in a news release Monday (http://bit.ly/ZBGA1W). CiG currently owns 81 tower sites in the continental U.S., including 29 in the Mid-Atlantic, 24 in California and 16 in the Southeast (http://bit.ly/12bP55N). Liberty Towers’ sites are in Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, New Jersey, North Carolina, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and West Virginia (http://bit.ly/10ewkf6).