Wireless Lans set to go public

Rene Millman asks how two incompatible modes can be linked.

While great advances in wireless technologies continue apace, enterprise users are still faced with the dilemma of incompatible wireless modes in the local and wireless area networks (Lans and Wans).

The incompatibility makes it more expensive to invest in such technologies for the enterprise as no technology spans both types of network. This poses the question of how to join these mismatched technologies together.

Recently, Nokia announced it was rolling out a combined GPRS-IEEE 802.11 wireless Lan (Wlan) card. In conjunction with Sonera, the incumbent Finnish telco, it is piloting Wlan roaming based on GSM technology.

Users install their Sim card inside an 802.11b Wlan card in a laptop, allowing them to roam onto a Wlan hotspot provided by GSM operators. Putting a Sim inside a Wlan card allows users to access the data channel of the GPRS Wan service when out of range of a hotspot.

This gives users wireless broadband services in hotspots provided by the telco. 'WGates', as Sonera calls them, have been installed in airports, hotels and conference centres around Finland. Worldwide, 6,000 Wlan areas now exist but most of these are private. Public Wlan areas are being launched by telcos to complement GPRS and third-generation (3G) services with their lower bandwidths and greater mobility.

Adding GPRS to Wlan has been pretty straightforward. Adding a Wlan connection to a GPRS phone is the next obvious target, although it is still some way off in the distance.

This points to a future where fast Wlan broadband access is available in public places for business users with slower GSM coverage elsewhere. Service availability may be linked to the rollout of 3G networks to get customers interested in broadband wireless access.

Bernt Ostergaard, director of Giga Research, believes that these wireless hotspots will satisfy some of the expectations that 3G won't for some time. "To meet this hype or disappointment factor, it is encouraging to see the Wlan people actually moving ahead at a very nice clip," he said.

He thought it would not be a ubiquitous service the way that GSM is at present. Public wireless access has been tried in the past when the French launched a similar technology in the 1980s called 'bebop'. "It didn't really fly, as business users didn't want to feel like they are in a phone box environment," Ostergaard said.

New Wlan services areas could be cheap to deploy. "It wouldn't cost a small hotel much, if it had a DSL connection, to add this facility. The price has gone down and performance has gone up," he explained.