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03/28/2006What's All the Buzz Outside Las Vegas?
The local telephone division of Sprint Nextel and the City of Henderson, Nevada, a large suburb of Las Vegas, have partnered to launch a Wi-Fi pilot program in two areas of the city—one of the first such efforts in the United States by a local telecom provider. Later this year, the Sprint Nextel local division will be rolled out as a new company called Embarq. Brian Koenig, Manager of Emerging Technologies for the new Embarq, spoke with The W2i Report about how the partnership and planning for the new broadband-wireless service kicked off with the city.
How did this all get going?
The city expressed public interest in Wi-Fi in October of last year, which was the exact same time my group got established. This trial in Henderson is a trial in the truest sense of the word. We are evaluating business models, from vendors to customer metrics to everything.
Why Henderson, in particular?
We have a great relationship, and they've been a customer for decades. We serve as the local telecom provider in Henderson, offering voice and data products, broadband, DSL and wireless phone services to the city and its residents. You factor in topology, and Henderson being rated one of the fastest-growing cities in the United States in the top five.
The new wireless service would presumably compete with preexisting broadband offerings?
Obviously, this is a somewhat competing product with existing services. It's something we're looking at, but in all honesty we look at this as an extension of our network, a value-add to existing customers. For example, it is possible, that for a nominal fee, you can add Wi-Fi mesh to your service and have broadband anywhere: wireline when you’re at home or in the office and while you’re mobile you have access to the Wi-Fi mesh.
Who’s the champion?
We unveiled plans at a public event on March 20th, with the mayor and department heads. But it’s being led by the CIO, and he reports directly to the city manager.
To what extent will the city be looking at multi-purpose and multiple user groups on the network?
The primary driver is public safety—first responders, fire department—as well as local-government operations, including building codes and traffic enforcement. The city is definitely talking apps—traffic management, meter reading—along with the benefit to the public. It’s early. We have had only preliminary conversations about what they want to do long term.
Any expectations for how the business model will evolve? Do you see the city as an anchor tenant?
It’s still unknown, whether there are any cost offsets, revenue share or what the overall business model will become. However, in my mind the city does fit my definition of an anchor tenant.
What should we watch for over the next two months?
I don't know how much we're going to put out in the next two months, publicly about this trial. Most likely sometime in May, we'll provide an update to the public.. We’ll be pursuing more trials.
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• Minneapolis as Municipal Wi-Fi "Poster Child"
• Los Angeles Catches the Citywide Wi-Fi Wave
• OneZone, Toronto Hydro Telecom, Canada
• Riverside `08
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