Wireless for the Long Haul

It's a whole new spin on the information highway. More long-distance truckers are now equipped with laptops — about 20% of all interstate drivers, in fact, up from 5% just three years ago. And while one in every five doesn't seem like a big number, keep in mind that there are about 2 million drivers across North America, and the percentage of those with laptops is expected to keep growing.

“Not only is it a big number, but it's a captive audience,” said Richard Tisdale, chief information officer of truck stop chain Petro Shopping Centers. “They have to go to truck stops to get the fuel and services they need.”

Those services have expanded to include Wi-Fi: SmartStop Wireless Solutions partnered with Petro and rival Flying J to create the Travel Plaza Alliance Network, an initiative to bring wireless broadband services to more than 200 truck stops by early fall.

SmartStop will develop interoperability, settlement and security standards that will make it possible for subscribers pulling into any Flying J or Petro truck stop to get online. The company also will be responsible for executing billing settlements and deploying the Wi-Fi system to Petro's 60 locations. (Flying J will handle the deployments at its 150 truck stops itself.) Pricing details are still in discussion. It costs between $8000 and $12,000 to outfit each truck stop with Wi-Fi, and the current thinking is that monthly subscriptions would range from $30 to $35.

With about 2000 truck stops scattered across the continent, Wi-Fi could become a key differentiator, particularly for fleet operations, some of which have as many as 10,000 trucks on the road, Tisdale said. For instance, Wi-Fi would make it easier for trucking firms to relay updated route information and provide pre-authorization for services the driver might need. It also will allow firms to monitor a rig's key components each time a driver pulls into a Petro or Flying J location, information that will aid maintenance and help to head off equipment failures.

Though SmartStop is shopping the concept to a variety of independent, regional and national truck stop operators, the trucker segment only represents a sliver of the full potential for the partnership, said Mark Evers, SmartStop's CEO. Evers believes there are hundreds of thousands of laptop-enabled workers — the so-called “mobile professional” segment — who collectively log millions of miles but for one reason or another can't justify flying from account to account. He said Wi-Fi-enabled truck stops would do for them what similarly equipped airports have done for that class of business traveler.

Empty-nester retirees who crisscross the county in their recreational vehicles are another potential demographic target. “A lot of RVs already have PCs on board, and RVers want to stay in touch with their grandkids and their investments,” Evers said.

That's a big 10-4.