Looking Inside the MeshBox - Page 2

Will The "Big Guys" Be Affected?

"There is certainly a lot of interest from the big players," says LocustWorld's Anderson. "In a dynamic market like wireless, we expect that our pioneering in this new area will bring more people into the area and provide opportunities for us to work with some of the bigger people in this industry."

David Chamberlain, research director at Probe Research, sees little or no impact on the established wireless players. He says that regardless of the extensions, 802.11 is still a local area network and can't replace a wide area network.

"Regardless of the number of free networks that are available, I think that the people who depend on it will be willing -- actually prefer -- to pay for it," says Chamberlain. He also notes that quality of service will be dodgy at best.

Chamberlain also says that local Bells will find a way to get their cut. "If they don't, they'll eventually find the small-time bandwidth sharers and stop them," says Chamberlain. "If it's the Wi-Fi providers such as T-mobile and Boingo, you will find that they will compete on other terms by offering value-added services, quality of service and the ability to roam among other subscription-based systems."

"Vendors such as Proxim, Linksys and others will most likely wait and see where the buying trend leads their competitive product map before significant effort is extended to make such inroads with the MeshBox niche," says OMNI's Bernhard. "Ultimately, the issues of security and interoperability can play a strategic role for the yet-undeclared winner."

"In the short term (1-3 years), this product would have minimal impact on the wireless incumbents," says Insight On Wireless' Luan. "The wireless incumbents provide a wide area network that this product would be hard pressed to duplicate." Luan lists obstacles to widespread use that includes wide adoption, established and guaranteed service levels and guaranteed service areas.

Luan explains that there are also several technical issues that need to be worked out with mesh networks. For example, with the Ricochet network, which was the first nationwide mesh network deployment, the base stations needed to be one or two hops away from a wireline connection, otherwise performance degraded. "I suspect that this would be the case here also," says Luan.

"It's possible that this product may impact the ISP before they impact the wireless incumbents, as local area, high-speed access would be easier to set up," adds Luan. "Of course, the ISP seeing this threat will take different measures. Some will forbid bandwidth sharing while other, more progressive ISPs, will charge with the increasing bandwidth levels."

"I believe that if the big guys perceive a threat from this type of platform, they will take steps to build or acquire their own," says META Group's Kozup. "The fact that this product is open source has limited weight in my mind in the context of Wi-Fi since it is by no means a requirement to offer low cost access points."

"The big guys should certainly not dismiss innovative products like the MeshAP because innovation is what is driving the WLAN market forward," says Frost & Sullivan's Lee. "How much market clout LocustWorld has depends on how well it gets it message out. I think it's really too early to tell."

Security Concerns

We asked our panel of experts if they had concerns with the technology. Not surprisingly, security topped the list, with marketing close behind. "The fact that the technology relies on open source code and a mesh topology would seem to me to make it less secure," says Aaron Vance, industry analyst at Synergy Research Group.

"Linux and x-type platforms have long been rebuffed on security issues," says OMNI's Bernhard. "Vulnerability in context to functional scalability is a taunting concern, especially given the rogue war-driving hackers that seem to cropping up everywhere these days."

"You need all manner of sophisticated software to control what happens in a mesh...imagine a denial of service attack on an open mesh," says Aberdeen Group's Craig.

Insight On Wireless' Luan points out several other paths that potential competitors are investigating to reach the goal of ubiquitous wireless coverage. These include the centrally managed and centrally deployed method of T-Mobile, Cometa, Wayport and others, and the centrally managed and virally deployed method of Toshiba and Pronto.

"My biggest concerns would probably be support and not necessarily support via online forums," says Frost & Sullivan's Lee. "If I want to offer a credible level of service I would want to make sure that I won't be left on my own if a user has a question."

"In today's world it's not about technology: it's about how well you can market technology," says Gartner's Dulaney. "And we don't see any evidence of this here. Nowhere does it say what it will cost. Also, let's see whether it can be put into high volume production. If he said he had a deal with Linksys then it might mean something."

"This seems like really cool technology, but in my professional opinion I don't think a product like this will be more than a niche product for the high tech, open source community," says Synergy's Vance. Its potential really depends on how well it can be mass marketed, how easy it is to use, and how much it costs."

"The WLAN hardware market is extremely competitive with a lot of different products," says Frost & Sullivan's Lee. "For this product to be successful, it would have to get the word out amidst all of the clamoring by other vendors. At the same time, pricing will always be an issue as there is relentless pressure on margins. Bottom line here, you may have the greatest WLAN product out there, but if no one knows about it then you might as well put it back on the shelf."

"If a product like this were to become a little more mainstream, perhaps if the technology were acquired by a large WLAN solutions provider, it might have a better chance to catch on," says Synergy's Vance. "I think that a product like this one has potential, but in order for the technology to really be effective, there would need to be a lot of these things deployed and I just don't see that happening without more marketing exposure or retail presence."

LocustWorld's Anderson recognizes the upcoming marketing challenge for his firm. "We need to bootstrap our entry into the market," says Anderson. "As our approach is novel and innovative, there is a lot of work needed for us to communicate the potential for mesh networking."