Sprint to use self-install for fixed wireless

(Telephony) Sprint’s Broadband Wireless group will use BroadJump’s self-provisioning software as part of its high-speed data installation process.

This marks the third leg of self-provisioning success for BroadJump, which has won contracts from cable operators AOL Time Warner and AT&T Broadband and DSL providers SBC and Sprint. For Sprint, it was a logical step from the software used by sister organization Sprint DSL.

“We’re already using it for self-install for our DSL offerings. Just from a time to market, it exists, so why should we develop software? We can do it a lot cheaper in working with them than develop in-house,” said Evan Conway, VP of broadband marketing for Sprint Wireless.

The transition from wired to wireless was painless for BroadJump.

“We were surprised with the similarity of the fixed wireless market to the other markets we’ve gone after,” said Matt Tormollen, BroadJump’s marketing vice president. “We’ve always built our products from the ground up to work in an IP layer and to extract the access layer as much as possible.”

BroadJump provides Sprint with a software license that entitles the service provider to distribute self-installation disks that configure the PC and e-mail accounts “and get them hooked up to our service,” said Conway.

The big difference now is “we don’t have to have the technicians stick around for the whole thing,” Conway said. “We let the customer install.”

Sprint has begun using the service in the 12 markets, including Phoenix, where the service has attracted double-digit thousands of customers.