Need for Wi-Fi

In Pakistan, the indispensability of Wi-Fi seems to be growing rapidly for the users of Smart devices (smartphones, tablets, notebooks, etc.). Wi-Fi is becoming a need to the point that customer experience of even unrelated services is seen to be affected by the availability (or lack thereof) of Wi-Fi service at a given place.
Some restaurant managers and café owners may not realise it, but Wi-Fi could be one of the factors that stand between their customers frequenting their establishment, or avoiding it.
Smartphone users in Pakistan – whose number is growing with the proliferation of nearly all brands of handsets available in various price ranges – have been in the long waiting game for high-speed mobile broadband, because the 3G license auction has kept on stalling. The mobile internet users thus have had to contend with pricey, but slow and choppy mobile data services via GPRS and Edge services.
While a mobile data service has the mobility edge for on-the-go communication, Wi-Fi is the preferred service in stationary situations due to its high speed. With or without 3G/4G, market exists for Wi-Fi services to the data users in public places, as evidence from the developed markets suggests. However, monetization of that market through a viable business model is largely missing in Pakistan due to the broadband service providers’ (BSP) passive approach on this segment.
Ubiquity of the Wi-Fi services in public places would require BSPs’ interest and involvement on a certain level. Deploying Wi-Fi hotspots at regular intervals of 100 meters (standard Wi-Fi range) in major urban metropolis (in areas where Smart device penetration is high) may solve the mobility issue. But that seems a lofty business case and is going to require substantial investment from BSPs.
While extended play and on-the-go Wi-Fi services seem difficult propositions, critical mass of mobile internet users exists in various establishments in major cities that can be targeted. A weak Wi-Fi footprint exists in some of these places – which include shopping malls, cafés & restaurants, educational & vocational institutes, fitness clubs, beauty salons, terminals (airports & railway station), etc. – but tremendous room exists for improvement.
This is already happening internationally. KDDI was one of the pioneers, and installed 100,000 Wi-Fi hotspots in Japan. In Indonesia, ‘Telekomunikasi Indonesia’ is reportedly planning to install 100,000 Wi-Fi hotspots at selected schools across the country this year. Thailand’s government is also planning to install 300,000 free Wi-Fi service points this year. ‘Telecom New Zealand’ is offering 100 free Wi-Fi hotspots during Dec-Mar across popular summer regions throughout New Zealand.
It is not that BSPs in Pakistan are not alive to this idea at all. Salman Mazhar, Manager, Corporate affairs and PR at Wateen Telecom Limited, told BR Research that Wateen had already taken the first step in the development of Wi-Fi hotspots in the country. “As of last month, Wateen Telecom has deployed over 250 Wi-Fi hotspots in the major cities of Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad,” he informed.
Parvez Iftikhar, an ICT expert & consultant, and the former CEO of Pakistan’s USF Co., believes that it makes good sense for the BSPs to invest in a brand development activity that offers Wi-Fi services in public places, which can add waiting lounges, car-wash stations, car workshops, and even bus stops to the above-mentioned places.
“The revenue model could be based on prepaid (through scratch cards) and/or by making it part of one’s postpaid subscription of the cell phone/landline. It doesn’t have to be free – but cheap, yes. If so many (users) can pay for the pathetically slow GPRS/Edge, several times more would be ready to pay for higher speed Wi-Fi,” he told BR Research.
Parvez thinks that such Wi-Fi deployments by BSPs would be good investment. “In most developed and developing countries, where 3G is running, Wi-Fi in public places is also running. Both are making money.”
Start with the low-hanging fruits! There are large corporate HQs and office buildings in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad, most of which house thousands of people, working 9-5. A majority of these folks happen to have Smartphones, and could really use a Wi-Fi service independent of their restricted office internet. A BSP can negotiate and take the permission, install a router on a building, and monetize the unmet connectivity needs.
As BSPs fight it out in a growing, subscriptions-based, household broadband market, fresh investment for large-scale Wi-Fi deployments may be difficult.
However, rather than a solo flight, collaboration should be sought with other market players, including the outlets mentioned above. A connectivity solution has to meet users’ needs at a price point that may converge differing expectations of service quality & delivery.