TMCnet Feature

I had the pleasure of spending quality time with Xirrus Senior Technologist and Director of Product Marketing Perry Correll at ITEXPO (News - Alert) East. He was on a panel I moderated on the Wi-Fi’s role in the virtualization of the enterprise and also gave the Thursday morning keynote speech “The Future of WiFi (News - Alert) in the Enterprise,” which is a must-read both context and conjecture.

As both of his talks concluded, the proliferation personal devices —based on growth in the numbers of users, the number of users with an exponentially growing number of devices, and the bring your own device (BYOD) trend — has created a wireless industry tipping point. Networks not only will have trouble handling the gross number of devices, but will be overwhelmed by their use of bit-hungry apps like video, interactive gaming, enriched social networking, etc.

The bottom line is that, like it or not -- and Correll says if you try it the right way you will like it -- wireless access points (APs) will become the dominant network edge. Enterprises will have no choice. And for performance, scalability, reliability and security reasons, Wi-Fi will be the enterprise infrastructure of choice going forward. Mobile service can’t provide the performance or handle the tsunami of traffic bit-hungry smartphones and especially tablets are creating and properly planned and deployed WiFi can accommodate the density of users and devices while providing a high-performance and secure user experience even for apps that need lots of bandwidth. 

As Correll’s keynote detailed, and as amplified by Julius Knapp (News - Alert), Chief Officer of Engineering and Technology at the Federal Communications Commission, in a keynote that immediately followed, the numbers concerning what the industry is facing are daunting. Just review the stats in Correll’s talk. Add to that in the U.S., for example, there is only 500MHz of new unlicensed spectrum available to be auctioned at a time when we are nearly exhausted in terms of what we are able to handle, and globally, the picture is bad and getting worse. Throw in the coming “iconic” earthquake that will occur when Apple introduces a 4G LTE iPhone (News - Alert), which forces a rush by network providers to deploy 4G networks, and it is easy to see what keeps people up at night.

In the short term, Wi Fi offload of traffic from cellular network and charging for usage above certain thresholds, are the only solutions. In the long term, the seamless meshing of unlicensed and licensed offerings, along with the enforcement of new policies and rules associated with a new generation of business models, is the path forward.

Enter “Agnostic Wireless”

Everything the two speakers cited unfortunately is known. The industry is behind the market in terms of keeping up. Correll made a powerful case for his view of the future, and others at the show have backed it up saying they can alleviate IT department concerns about security issues by providing solutions that control not just access according to personal profiles but also by device type and application use. That said, a phrase Correll put forth struck me as one that needs to become a term of art for all of us. He foresaw a world that was characterized as being “Agnostic Wireless.” What does this mean, and why is it important?

What it means must be viewed from the lens of the customer and not the service provider. When I get off a plane from San Francisco to London, I want to be able to turn on my device of choice and have it seamlessly and automatically connect to the best-performing and least expensive network that allows me to do what I need according to my policies and rules. In lay terms, for instance, enabling me on a Wi Fi public hotspot so I can make VoIP calls and not have to pay international roaming charges would be a good start. Provision my VPNs so I can attach to my local corporate network and get to my business tools and databases. Hopefully, you get the picture and can imagine your own scenario. 

Ironically, Knapp discussed his frustration of being able to easily access cellular networks when he travels, but finds getting Internet access on a broadband pipe like Wi Fi more than a bit aggravating. It should not be. The lines between unlicensed and licensed services are blurring and radios are becoming less expensive, which means devices will be multi-modal and have lots of smarts for doing all of the things necessary to secure sessions that adhere to policies and rules as defined by the user and that are acceptable when the user is in business persona mode. 

Correll says the industry Hotspot 2.0 initiatives are aimed at creating this type of user experience. We can only hope so. Agnostic wireless needs to become an industry generic. One of the reasons the wireless industry finds itself on the brink of major problems is because they missed the reality that the relationship between buyers and sellers changed with the Internet and became exacerbated in the mobile space with the introduction of the iPhone and tablets. Users are driving the bus.

Whoever figures out how to offer an agnostic wireless user experience, and also devises a business model/ecosystem that allows the creation of not just revenues but profits, will win.   So thank you Perry for the contribution to the industry discussion. It will be interesting to see who takes up the cause.  

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