The Hindu Business Line : Internet unplugged!

Visualise a scene where the Internet is always available and is, literally, in the air. All you need to connect is an antenna on your rooftop. You can throw away those wires. Sounds fine but is it happening? Just read on to find out how wire-less wireless can really get.

ZAMORA, in Spain, is the world's first "hot city" - the Internet is always available, and is literally in the air. Users can log into the Net from anywhere in the city, wirelessly. Homes in Zamora, for instance, just need a simple antenna on their rooftops to be able to connect to the world. The city has managed to give 68,000 people access to the Internet, through over 250 Wifi "hotspots'' in government offices, cafes, and restaurants, each covering a radius of about 100 yards. Needless to say Internet usage, which was limited to 20 per cent of the population, has now jumped remarkably.

The story is a favourite one with Intel, (which together with AT&T and IBM was responsible for networking the Spanish city) and is used often to drive in the importance of Wifi (wireless fidelity) technology.

Wifi or wireless fidelity, which uses the 802.11 frequency to transmit data, is one of the hottest subjects today. There is a new spurt of interest in Wifi, and one measure of the attention it has been attracting is chip giant Intel's own plans for the technology.

Intel's just launched Centrino mobile processor comes with wireless capability embedded in it. Laptops with the Centrino processor are automatically Wifi-enabled and don't need any additional wireless cards. It is a big directional change, and the Centrino brand marks as important a turning point as Pentium.

Intel is committed to encouraging the growth of the wireless ecosystem. It has set aside $150 million to invest in companies working on Wifi technology. The company is also actively setting up infrastructure (i.e, public "hotspots", or Internet access points) in association with hotels, airports, cafés and restaurants all over the world.

Revolution in the air

In India, two things have happened to drive the growth of wireless. One is the delicensing of 802.11, the frequency of radio waves, which allow data to be carried through air as it were, and the other is the "realisation that 3G is no longer the road to nirvana," says Intel's General Manager, Internet Solutions Group, G.B. Kumar. (Incidentally, Intel has more reason to back Wifi, where laptops are the access devices, rather than 3G, where the target products were consumer goods and non-PC devices.)

Other companies in India are part of the revolution, though in different ways. Ittiam, for instance, is one of the only Indian companies and among a handful of global companies, which has wireless LAN IP. Ittiam's IP for wireless connectivity will be sold to chip makers, who can integrate this into their chips to offer a Wifi-enabled chip. Ittiam has also set up a demo site in a Café Coffee Day outlet in Bangalore. The idea is that people wandering in for a cup of coffee can also get to do some Internet surfing at their tables.

Convergent Technologies, a networking company, has already set up wireless networks for seven Taj group hotels around the country, as well as some MNC offices in India.

Hotspots in hotels would come under the public hotspot category. The Taj group is reportedly planning to offer the facility as a value-added service, though it has yet to begin advertising the fact, says Chidambara, Business Manager and Consultant — Wireless, Convergent Communications. Guests would be handed a wireless card on arrival, together with their room keys. They would then be charged according to usage.

The new Rs 5000 PC from Netcore and Via Technologies is also banking on Wifi proliferation and costs of wireless connectivity coming down. The 5KPC's USP is its affordability. The machine works only when it is connected to a network, which means that connectivity should be low cost to keep the total cost of ownership down.

Netcore's Rajesh Jain sees potential for the 5KPC in hotels offering Wifi. Rooms can offer the machines for guests, who can log into the Internet immediately. Business travellers will no longer have to lug laptops around. They can, in any case, log into their own company intranets through VPN.

Companies offering solutions for transport corporations are also looking at Wifi. MobiApps's and Triad Fleet Control's applications for the transport sector are banking on Wifi to download data from "black boxes" in vehicles to the central server using wireless connectivity.

Glitches on the way

As can be expected of any emerging technology businesses, there are operational glitches that have to be solved. Hotspots around the world are all not accessible by everyone, partly because the WISPs (Wireless Internet Service Providers) offering the service are not clear about how to bill users who are not regular customers. Says Kumar of Intel, "All international airports - Frankfurt, Singapore, San Francisco — are now public hotspots, but I cannot log into them."

The various PC vendors also need to have a system that can log into any hotspot. Intel is doing its bit by validating each of the world's hotspots in an effort at some kind of standardisation. It has so far validated over 80 per cent of the hotspots in the world.

Security is even bigger an issue than normal in the wireless world. For instance, the Intel and Microsoft office in New Delhi are in the same building and they are both on wireless networks. Imagine the havoc it would create if the employees of one company sitting just a wall away could download data from the other on their laptops!

On the positive side, costs are significantly lower than dial up and the speed is many times faster. Jain of Netcore expects wireless prices to come down further in the next one year. Media Labs Asia recently demonstrated in Kanpur that Wifi networks can work over a 37-km range.

"It is clearly a mainstream technology," says Kumar, quoting predictions of wireless users touching 31 million by 2007. In line with the belief, Intel hopes that the Centrino laptop would be in the same price brand as the non-Centrino ones. The incremental difference would be very small, "as we plan to play a volume game," says Kumar.

Intel has launched a worldwide program to build awareness of Wifi and plans to persuade public hotspots like hotels, airports and cafés into using "Wifi zone" branding.

chitphad@thehindu.co.in

Picture by Shaju John

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication

Stories in this Section
Tapping technology

No tiger in the picture

Playing catch-up

Move it!

Bringing treasures within reach

Internet unplugged!

Web sites on your PC

Recovering file from Recycle Bin

Some grammar too, please