Mark Johnson, CEO, SkyPilot

When we were funded, we were originally going to be an operator and do equipment as well. We think carriers’ problem is economics, not technology. How does a carrier make money as opposed to deploying something and losing money? We felt it was better to do a non-WiMax product knowing it’s probably closer to WiMax than a lot of the guys calling themselves pre-WiMax.

What we’ve got to get out of in this industry is the sense that it’s all one or another. It’s not WiMax versus WiFi. It’s how do you solve the business problem, and there are different tools for different pieces of the problem. We provide an excellent last-mile piece. Our mesh doesn’t lend itself as strongly to some of those long point-to-point shots. But getting down deep and dense cost-effectively to spread capacity around, we do well there.

WiFi was something new that created a pull, freeing consumers from the hardness of wires. Once people saw that, Apple included it in its technology, pushing aspects of mobility. When you look at WiMax, the question is: What’s the problem that solves for the customer? What will drive the really high volumes? I’m not sure what that is today that isn’t already served by something else. All the vendors we’ve talked to are certainly looking at more of the backhaul use until you can get the economics of the silicon down to the point where it can make a lot of sense going deeper. It will be a while.

802.11 is well-established; it’s not going away. Standards bodies continue to add enhancements. You’ll see WiFi phones this year, WiFi cameras--you name it. As people build infrastructure in fixed wireless, they can ride the price curves that the industry provides us. Or they can go to some of the earlier WiMax equipment to do some of those longer shots as well. Touching the customer will be WiFi because everyone has it. Users aren’t going to change devices. Dell’s not going to throw a WiMax radio into their PCs anytime soon. All the phones coming out with WiFi aren’t going to change to the new chip set anytime soon. Where meshing comes in, I think 802.11 is going to hold its own for a while because all the meshing solutions that are out there today are on top of that. With Motorola’s acquisition of Mesh Networks, perhaps they’ll try to move that technology over to WiMax. Certainly given our architecture, that’s something you’ll see us doing as we come out with a WiMax product.

With the curve we see in 802.11, it certainly is at a commodity price point today, but it’s taken several years. What’s it take to drive that sort of volume for 802.16? Backhaul, that’s good volume, but that’s a lot different than being in every PC that ships. What’s it take to move to that level? I don’t know how long that’s going to take.