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I do applaud wireless internet companies that are fighting the good fight today. However, I feel like the big three wireless companies (Verizon, T-Mobile, and A
by mdasen 5y ago
I do applaud wireless internet companies that are fighting the good fight today. However, I feel like the big three wireless companies (Verizon, T-Mobile, and AT&T) are likely going to eclipse them in the near future. When dealing with wireless home internet, a lot of it is going to depend on the amount of spectrum you have, how much that spectrum can cover (lower frequencies travel farther), and how much resources you have to deploy it. I think that the big three wireless companies are going to win on those fronts.
Aristotle has 40MHz of CBRS (3.5GHz) spectrum and can also use up to 80MHz more of unlicensed spectrum (though that could suffer interference problems from basically anyone else that wants to use the unlicensed portion). The big three companies have more spectrum - T-Mobile has 335MHz, AT&T 246MHz, and Verizon 290MHz. Not only that, it's across more frequency bands which has implications for coverage. Low-band (below 1GHz) spectrum will travel farther and be less susceptible to disruption. AWS/PCS spectrum from 1.7GHz to 2.1GHz and 2.5GHz BRS/EBS spectrum will travel farther than 3.5GHz spectrum. And yes, the big three also have CBRS/C-Band 3.5/3.7GHz spectrum.
These companies are going to have an army of wireless technicians, a lot more spectrum, and the money to invest in deploying it. T-Mobile already has 30M eligible households for their home internet (around 20-25% of US households) and I'm sure it isn't perfect, but it will be improving rapidly over the next few years as they bring lots more spectrum online. Verizon has announced home internet plans as well (I think hitting 30M by the end of 2023 and 75M by the end of 2024 or 2025, but this is from memory here).
To make a simple comparison, Verizon is going to be averaging 174MHz of 3.5/3.7GHz spectrum vs Aristotle with 40MHz. To me, it seems like Verizon is going to be able to deploy a better home internet service. However, rural wireless carriers have put up a good fight in the past and often serve areas where the big three don't. Aristotle might also invest in equipment that simply works better for what their customers want.
For example, T-Mobile's home internet service just uses a router/modem that's the size of a WiFi router. There's no fancy large antenna or anything. Aristotle might work with their customers to install high-gain directional antennas much like rural people are used to installing for terrestrial or satellite TV. Localities might be more willing to give a small, local company like Aristotle access to their water towers in a way that they wouldn't give the big three access. Aristotle might also be better able to find a report with customers about the trade-offs of adding more capacity, cost, traffic management, etc.
But T-Mobile could copy that playbook in the coming years. T-Mobile has talked a lot on investor calls about seeing rural customers as one of their big growth areas over the next 5 years. If Aristotle can make it work with 3.5GHz spectrum, T-Mobile's 2.5GHz spectrum has better coverage and they have more of it.
I'm probably being overly pessimistic, but it just seems hard to compete with the big three wireless companies.
- syshum 5y agoI would bank on Starlink and Amazon long before I would bet on TMobile who can not even get reliable service for 4G let alone think they are going to take over Home Wireless I still have my doubts that any wireless can ever replace the reliability and low latency of FTH. I have no desire to have mobile internet experience from my gaming system or desktop computer. I will keep my Fiber thanks. I also for Verizon have my doubts that the "no data caps" they are selling today will last as they get more customers moved off their wire services on to the more profitable wireless. This bait and switch is old hat for the telecom's it will be just a few years, if not a few months before they backdoor in some data caps due to the ever famous "network congestion" that will always plague high density wireless deployments While the Big 3 have all the spectrum, they incompetently use is, and simply have it because they can afford to pay the FCC billions in the corrupt "auction" system the FCC uses to allocate said spectrum. The Big 3 carriers have proven to be terrible network operators and people only use them because they have no other choice. Wireless carriers in the US have a lower approval rating than the US Congress
- kiwijamo 5y agoHome wireless is great for low-end users. My mother is on a 4G wireless service for her home phone and internet, with a price lower than what she'd pay for the equivalent copper/fibre service. While I certainty would never want to use 4G wireless for my own home internet, I can see why it is a great value proposition for those who just need email and the occasional FaceTime call. It also helps that existing cellular telcos already have heaps of 4G towers so customers are likely to be near one and get a good service (and in any case carriers usually don't provide fixed wireless services in areas where their network suffering from capacity issues). My mother incidentally lives right across the road of her serving cell site which makes the service even more reliable and speedy for her--and even if that was not the case, her carrier has been deploying hundreds of new 4G sites each year in our small 5 or so million population country so the service is improving all the time across the entire country. So there is a nice double win -- on one hand mobile subscribers benefit from much better capacity and improved coverage (much of which wouldn't have happened if it was not for fixed wireless) while on the other hand people now have more options for their home/fixed internet. I was previously a skeptic of fixed wireless--but having seen how well it works for low end fixed wireless users while also improving things for mobile customers as well I am now entirely in favor of it. Fibre will still be the best option for high end users (such as >99% of the HN audience) and I can't see it going away anytime soon. There's too many families, small businesses, student flats, etc for which fibre would continue to be more cost effective option for the speed and QOS provided.