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March 2007 Archive

The Power of the Press

We'll be talking more and more about this, the power of good press, especially regarding Community Involvement and Economic Development. There are two key constituencies in a metropolitan broadband deployment: Internal and External. Good public relations ensures that the groups that will be impacted by your project get the appropriate messaging.

And the messages to each group will vary somewhat. While common material will explain the basics of the project to all audiences, the benefits message will vary based on your audience. After some exchanges with reporters after the press release went out on Wednesday, I realized the complexity of the message and wrote a blog to capture the important details. It's important to have a consistent message, and I hoped the blog could serve as a resource until we get a website up (shortly). I see it as in our interest to help the press out, to provide a common touch point for the press to get background information, which both makes their job easier and ensures consistency of message.

Here's a list of the positive press we received over the last three days (one outlier is the coverage of the 3/6 City Council meeting, before we released the Press Release on 3/28). Just imagine your city's name substituted in press releases like these. At the outset, the press reports are universally positive. Pretty Cool.

3/8 - San Marcos Daily Record

3/28 - Fox 7 News

3/29 - KLBJ-AM Morning News; Austin American Statesman; RoadRunner Portal / News 8; and Wi Fi Networking News

3/30 - MuniWireless; and San Antonio Express News

UPDATE: 4/1 - Seguin Gazette-Enterprise (Seguin is a town about half the size of San Marcos, about 30 miles to the south ... this is an example of the "Ripple Effect," where like ripples in a pond after a stone is thrown in, the impact expands in the region)

UPDATE: 4/4 San Marcos Daily Record

UPDATE: 4/5 - Texas Government Insider

UPDATE: 4/11 - University Star, student newspaper of Texas Statue University

So who is reading this stuff and why does it matter?

The lists of Internal and external constituents are each quite detailed - there are more different parties who are impacted by a project like this than one would think at first. They include a laundry list of community stakeholders and industry types. Here goes:

Internal Audience (Community Involvement)

Government
City (City Staff, both Management and Line); City Council (Mayor and City Council Members)
County (County Staff, both Management and Line); County Commissioners Court (Judge and Precinct Commissioners)

Education
Higher Education (Universities and Community Colleges, including Administration Management, Administration Employees, Faculty & Faculty Organizations, Students & Student Organizations, Families of Students)
K-12 Education - School Districts & Schools (Administration Management, Administration Employees, Faculty & Faculty Organizations, Students & Student Organizations, Parents, Relatives, & Guardians, Volunteer Groups)
Vocational - Job Training, etc. (Administration Management, Administration Employees, Faculty, Students & Student Organizations)

Business / Commercial
Economic Development (Chambers of Commerce, including Management, Board, Member Businesses, and Convention & Visitor's Bureau; Economic Development Council, including Board & Staff; and Downtown Association, including Member Representatives)
Businesses - Owners and Managers (Major Employers, Industrial, Retail, SMB, Locally-owned, National chains, and Franchises)

Community (i.e., Residential)
Groups (Council of Neighborhood Associations, Neighborhood Associations, Clubs, Service Organizations)
Individuals (Neighborhoods & Subdivisions, Apartment Complexes, Dormitories)

Health Care
Hospitals & Clinics (including EMS, Doctors Offices)

External Audience (Economic Development)

Neighboring Communities

Economic Development Targets
Business considering relocation
Indivduals & Families considering relocation

Telecommunications & Applications Providers
Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and Wireless ISPs (WISPs) (Incumbents, including Telecom ISP, Cable ISP; and Competitors, including ISPs and WISPs)
Hardware & Software Application Providers (Public Sector Applications, including Public Safety, Emergency Responder, Field Mobile Data Communications, Utility Automated Meter Reading (AMR), Utility Field Sensors & SCADA, Voice over IP (VOIP), Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), Video Surveillance, and Video Streaming; and Consumer Applications, including Voice over IP (VOIP) and more - much more - but I'm out of steam). - See www.wikimetronet.com for a more comprehensive list of wireless applications.

As you can see, there are an amazing number of groups and people who are interested in what you are doing to bring metropolitan broadband to your community. Metropolitan Broadband is exciting stuff. Really.

So if one has an exciting and positive story to tell about one's community and about one's project (and EVERYONE doing a project like this does), why on earth would one want to soft pedal it? The rule of thumb is: be proud and be loud - your project will be the better for it. As long as you stick to facts and don't embellish, you're on solid ground. The more excitement you generate, and the better you educate all concerned, the more your project will be energized and the more resources will come out of the woodwork to make it happen. Don't underestimate the importance of wide-spread support and don't shirk in your efforts to recruit it.

The press is your friend, so take care of them and they will communicate better, which will serve you well.

Posted on March 31, 2007 at 06:02 PM | Comments (0)

A Divine Comedy: Paradox, Competition, and Cooperation

A paradox is an apparently true statement or group of statements that leads to a contradiction or a situation which defies intuition. Typically, either the statements in question do not really imply the contradiction, the puzzling result is not really a contradiction, or the premises themselves are not all really true or cannot all be true together. The word paradox is often used interchangeably and wrongly with contradiction; but whereas a contradiction asserts its own opposite, many paradoxes do allow for resolution of some kind.

The recognition of ambiguities, equivocations, and unstated assumptions underlying known paradoxes has led to significant advances in science, philosophy and mathematics. But many paradoxes, such as Curry's paradox, do not yet have resolutions which are accepted by everybody. Wikipedia on "Paradox"

I visited another Texas city that is considering metropolitan broadband and the paradox of cooperation and competition was an underlying theme of our stimulating 2 and 1/2 hour conversation. What a rich topic this is! I sincerely hope that most cities are having or are going to have soon a conversation like we had last Friday.

Resolution of paradox is no easy thing. Just try to make it simple - it won't work. To get past a paradox requires some deep thinking and wrestling with conflicting ideas. The good thing is that the exercise, while necessary, provides ancilliary benefits, like muscles that show up after your workout. A community that wrestles with paradoxes by talking and working things out to their mutual advantage is demonstrating healthy behavior that is a great indicator of future success - and this is success that begets a pattern of success, because working together is an essential component of a healthy society.

This reasoning underlies my argument that the best metropolitan broadband project is begun immediately - no sense waiting if you know it's a long journey - but then proceeds slowly, with steady attention to inclusiveness and diversity of opinion and steady mutual learning of lessons on how to work together better. Lots of listening ensures that the entire situation gets fair consideration and the odds of maneuvering past all the obstacles dealing with a paradox throws your way go up considerably.

When considering cooperation and competition, you see that on the one hand, they lie on either end of a scale that defines how we interact in society - seeming polar opposites. On the other hand, in our daily lives we regularly switch back and forth on our attitude about the two - the answer to how one feels about cooperation and competition is most often "it depends." These lessons start immediately in life, from the Terrible Twos onward, because its the Ego that tells us we are separate and have to compete, but the rational brain recognizes the benefits of cooperation in society. It's situational. It's a nuanced answer, no way around it. Ambiguity on this subject is unavoidable.

You may think you have a rock-solid hold on the situation. "I'm in favor of private sector competition - it's the bedrock of our market economy. It's a matter or principles." But let the market fail you on competition - it can go stale, be abused, or simply be unattainable or impractical - and watch your strong convictions fade. At least I hope they do. There are few things more frustrating than one who holds on to a conviction in the face of overwhelming evidence of the need to let go. When conviction yields to reason is the point at which a market or a society really begins to function in a healthy way and progress is attainable.

When it comes to infrastructure, the underlying support for our daily lives, we tend to benefit from cooperation more than competition, so we turn to the government at its different levels to help manage the situation. In the US, we have a tendency to turn to competition and the private sector whenever we can, sometimes almost to a fault, to our detriment. Other societies and economies have less of a bias to the private sector, and whether or not you favor that approach is a matter of political persuasion.

We mostly build our roads in cooperative fashion, primarily with different public sector entitites coordinating so that the road system, as the physical connection mechanism for our communities, develops to serve all of society. Toll roads, the exception to the rule when it comes to streets and roads, are making a comeback in more congested areas, in the face of difficult financing decisions, but they remain a hotly debated topic in Texas today, especially with the Legislature in session this spring.

But with our electric and telecommunication infrastructure, two other vast connecting networks that we depend upon, the situation is more varied and regional. It's an incremental, mostly blended solution, where prime markets received the first attention from very large private corporations, which built out infrastructure in exchange for agreeing to be regulated to ensure societal benefits. Smaller markets are served in regulated competitive fashion by larger private companies, smaller private companies, or in cooperative fashion by either public sector entities or non-profit cooperatives. It behooves us to re-examine this situation in light of today's market realities, as the need for affordable and ubiquitous broadband connectivity grows inexorably and challenges old paradigms.

In our particular case on Friday, we talked about these subjects in two contexts. First, we talked about market failure: the current availability of affordable broadband in the community and the fact that residential cable broadband is priced at nearly $100/month. Ouch! One could make an argument that competition in this case no longer works for society, but primarily for the benefit of the cable company. The question is how longer society deems this situation to be tolerable, and when they decide to act, just what they intend to do about it. This is the engine that is driving this new industry.

Second, we talked about the issue of regional cooperation - when does it make sense for a community to cooperate with other communities on a metropolitan broadband project? In an ideal world, I would argue for a larger region to cooperate, and I have on this website. But practically speaking, those in a region often consider themselves as competing against each other and do not share my views, and I've gotten the message. There is a middle way though.

It appears the rational choice for city leaders is to a) limit the size of the initial project to the immediate region; b) invite other smaller satellite cities or neighbors in the immediate vicinity to participate in the initial project, while ceding control to the majority partner; and c) hold the larger or more far-flung neighbors at arm's length, at least until after the project has been completed. In a rural county, this probably means the major city drives the project and invites county neighbors to join in. In an urban county, it looks like this is translating into every man/woman for him/herself.

Viewed through the lens of regional competition, this approach makes some sense. "Let other cities model or join in with us AFTER our project is completed, which provides the benefits of cooperation to the region, yet by deferring interaction, preserves the benefits of competition to our first mover community - after all, we pioneers deserve some benefit from going first and taking that extra risk, but we still have the long-term vitality of the region to think about."

As for the first case - where free market competition has failed, at least temporarily, the introduction of a metropolitan broadband project by the city government is corrective, because it changes the fundamental market dynamic, which can lead to two principal outcomes, both beneficial to the society.

First, it can cause the monopolistic service provider to recognize that its hold has slipped, so it drops its high rates back down to a competitive level voluntarily, to prevent mass defection of customers. There will still be many subscribers who will leave if given the chance, for reasons other than price, but the incumbent can preserve revenue by proactively dropping prices. I'm still not so sure how common such magnanimous and far-sighted executive management is. They have to accept the shift to a competitive market, and denial is a powerful force.

A second, more likely scenario is that after the project is underway, the incumbent lowers its rates, but not dramatically. The result is that they let more competition into the market and while you have redundant infrastructures, consumers get more choices and this leads to longer-term competitive behaviors in a more fair market.

Either way, the community wins across the board when it accepts the paradox and works together to embrace and launch a metropolitan broadband project:

- they are hastening the advent of local access to THE infrastructure of the 21st Century - MOBILE BROADBAND;
- they are acting in healthy cooperative fashion as a community, which is contagious and a lot funner than the alternative of incessant bickering of competing interests;
- they are stimulating greater market competition in a commodity service and/or lower prices, with either outcome beneficial;
- they ensure greater social equity by including more citizens in the Have category and addressing the Digital Divide, especially among school kids; and
- they jump-start their economy with a newer, more vital market scenario and greater access to new digital applications and content.

To resolve the inherent paradox of metropolitan broadband, communities need to acknowledge the validity of BOTH competition and cooperation, accept BOTH private sector and public sector roles, decide to move immediately but slowly in order to be more successful, and embrace the fact that WIN/WIN is the only pathway out of the forest and into the sunny meadow, for long-term, sustainable, healthy community interaction. That is what makes a city a desirable place to live and work, and achieving that nirvana is a worthy goal and the sign of strong leadership.

Posted on March 26, 2007 at 05:57 AM | Comments (0)

It's Time ... Let Your Light Shine

Here's a radical idea whose time has come.

From the outset of a discussion and investigation into the potential of building a metropolitan broadband network, public officials and city leaders should go public and speak out, highlighting their intention to bring a broadband network to town and their discoveries along the way, leading up to their decision and ultimate deployment of the network.

I've watched these network launches for a long, long time and come to the conclusion that there is little downside to shouting from the mountaintops at each stage of your investigation into metropolitan broadband. I'm not crazy, I just think we are all way too shy about this process. Sure, some well publicized projects have received this treatment, but way too many have kept their projects and plans under wraps. It reflects well on a city and its leadership if it has an open process, and the fact that leaders are leaning in this direction to take action to provide for their broadband connectivity is a very positive sign of their city's potential as a place to live and work in the 21st Century digital economy.

Together with Patti Hill at Blabbermouth PR, MetroNetIQ issued a press release today announcing our strategic partnership and our plans to work together with cities to tie together metropolitan broadband, economic development, and a strategic PR program. Please check it out.

Even though economic development is touted as one of the three principal benefits of municipal wireless networks (along with efficient city government and ubiquitous access to cheap broadband) - even though it's right there as a key benefit - there still aren't that many cities yet that have a strategy per se about leveraging their metropolitan broadband plans to the hilt, and that are very vocal about what a great city they are for thinking about this. They should shout it from the hilltops that they are the best thing since sliced bread, and their broadband plans are but one more piece of evidence to make their case.

Curiously, at the outset, as they wade into the stream and test the waters on what is initially viewed by most as a city IT project, they seem to wing it from an economic development perspective. It may take cities one or two years to investigate the many different aspects of broadband and come to a decision on what to do. While some projects get a lot of press, many leaders tend to do their investigative work in the background until they come to some consensus and take some decisive action. It's as if they don't think they should make public announcements until they've decided that they're serious in their intentions to do something regarding broadband (and are assured that they are going to act on their intentions).

But seriously, what community today does not consider broadband communications as critical to their future? It's not just local area network connectivity either (for instance, a municipal wireless system). Cities need to ensure that they're on the Internet superhighway with a big fat pipe. There's a good analogy here with the transportation system: it's not unlike having not only great streets inside the city, but also good roads to physically connect your city to the state and national highway system and by extension, to other cities. This applies equally, or even more so, to the small cities and towns as it does to bigger cities that get all the press attention.

And right on cue, here's an article confirming my point. See today's Government Technology magazine: Digital Prosperity by Robert D. Atkinson & Andrew S. McKay.

The authors provide significant facts and arguments to show that all around the world, ICT - information and communication technology - is increasingly responsible for a lion's share of economic wealth creation. All the drivers of ICT - the servers, storage, communciation gear - they're all getting better and cheaper, and over time, the cummulative effect is to kick us all into high gear, efficiency wise.

There is no doubt that the IT revolution has enhanced quality of life, from improving health care, to making it easier for children to get better information and learn more, to giving consumers more convenience in their interactions with business and government and making it easier to measure environmental quality. But while these and other benefits are important, perhaps the most important benefit of the IT revolution is its impact on economic growth. The diffusion of information technology and telecommunications hardware, software, and services turns out to be a powerful driver of growth, having an impact on worker productivity three to five times that of non-IT capital (e.g., buildings and machines). In fact, in the United States IT was responsible for two-thirds of total factor growth in productivity between 1995 and 2002 and virtually all of the growth in labor productivity. Atkinson & McKay

So if I'm in an economic development position in a city, why shouldn't I crow about the money I'm investing in IT and communications capacity and my plans? Let the other guys brag about new buildings and factories - odds are, my plans will play out positively. A 21st Century Digital Infrastructure - done rght - is going to pay off in spades and those cities that go about this process of bringing in a metropolitan broadband network in an open, diligent, businesslike fashion have nothing to hide and everything to gain by bringing along their community as they learn, by talking loudly, widely, and long to the outside world about what their new plans will do to make an already great place to live even better.

It's time to speak up and let your light shine. The future is bright for those cities that invest wisely in IT and communications and let the world know about it.

Posted on March 20, 2007 at 11:13 PM | Comments (0)

In the Air Tonight ... or Some Night Soon

I can feel it coming in the air tonight, oh lord
Ive been waiting for this moment, all my life, oh lord
Can you feel it coming in the air tonight, oh lord, oh lord
Phil Collins, "In the Air Tonight" from his album "Face Value"

Big sigh here. I feel this way everytime I set out to write about the topic of Unlicensed Spectrum: "I've been waiting for this moment, for all my life, oh lord..."

It seems to me that when it comes to the issue of spectrum management, and more particularly, to the issue of unlicensed spectrum and the transition from an Analog World to a Digital World - it seems as if the FCC moves at a snail's pace. And the result is almost always the same - the FCC shows its preference for auctions and immediate short-term revenue gain from auction proceeds, implicitly denying the value of the innovation that comes from letting go of spectrum - making it "Unlicensed" - so that it can be used creatively and efficiently by innovators.

In many ways, this particular failure of the FCC strikes me as the worst of government, but at the same time a tragic irony as well - this predilection to continue regulating when the need has evaporated is practiced by conservatives who believe in limited government. Of all people, you'd think they would want to shrink government and give the control of the airwaves back to the people and small business - that's what I call Irony!

So, in this particular chapter of Bad Government, programs put in place that made sense in one era continue and take on a life of their own, becoming a stumbling block to innovation and change in another era. And all this is done with the full weight of the federal government bureaucracy and the imprimatur of officialdom, all under the heading of well-meaning regulators (I'm being charitable here) doing their job as "responsible stewards of the public trust."

Can we really expect regulators to quit regulating and put themselves out of a job? I don't think that happens very often - never, in the case of the current FCC - such agencies have to be told how to act and so I'm looking to Congress for any hope I have for more unlicensed spectrum. And when does Congress act? Arguably, most of the time they act when a crisis forces them to, rarely when the Public Interest requires them to....generally, Congress acts when the selfish interests of one powerful lobby come up against the selfish interests of another powerful lobby and an external catalyst sparks action.

That's what's coming up, folks, with the spectrum allotted for analog broadcast TV coming into play (Digital TV will free up valuable lower end spectrum in 2009), Big Tech has lined up against Big Telecom. This will be a very interesting battle to watch. Tom Evslin, writing in his blog Fractals of Change has two very good posts that do a much better job than I can do in describing this situation and its importance to cracking the nut that US broadband infrastructure has become.

Two bills have been introduced in the Senate to speed up what seems to be an interminable FCC process. A bill from Senators John Kerry (D-MA) and Gordon Smith (R-OR) would require the FCC to allow unlicensed use of this spectrum within 180 days of enactment. Another bill from John Sununu (R-NH) has a 90 day deadline but allows the FCC to reserve some of the frequencies for licensed use. Note that if you are automatically sensing unused frequencies you actually can start before 2009 when more frequencies will become available.

For a great exposition of issues and a good primer on spectrum, which I won't recapitulate here, I recommend you go to Fractals of Change to check out these two articles - "More on Frequency Regulation - It Matters" and "Internet Alternatives: A Good Beginning."

Take a moment and read Tom's analysis and case for unlicensed spectrum - good graphics too! And send a copy to your Congressman and Senator! Make your voice heard.

Posted on March 17, 2007 at 07:33 AM | Comments (0)

Industry Snapshot - Final Thoughts on MuniWireless Texas 07

Once more, I have to hand it to the folks at MuniWireless and MicroCast - one week after I drove up to Dallas, this Sunday morning I'm still pondering my impressions of last week at the MuniWireless Texas 07 Conference (see that link for presentations - some good ones!). So here's a shout out for Esme, Gary, Mike, Joe, and Amy, as well as some of my random thoughts and conclusions for you all to chew on.

1. The industry supply chain looks increasingly like a barbell to me, with more growth at the ends than in the middle. On one end, we see lots of mesh equipment with vendors showing budding interest in application integration, and on the other end a large wave of cities entering the market, many with confirmed budgets and more sophisticated outlooks than last year at this time. Great news! But in the middle, we still see a skinny service provider segment, dominated by the relatively giant Earthlink; struggling MobilePro and its subsidiary Kite Networks, and MetroFi; and any number of smaller more regional players. Did I leave anybody out? In the middle we also saw at this conference a growing number of new entrant consultants holding their hands up in one main session, seemingly drawn into this new industry by its confirmed growth potential and excitement in the media, but still lacking the experience and depth of the relatively small handful of more senior consultants with three plus years in this industry.

2. Cities' interest in the details of mesh equipment may be waning, challenging the continued dominance of trade show presence by manufacturers of these foundational technologies. I heard some city guys say that mesh equipment was "just a commodity," suggesting that attempts to differentiate on technology capability may not be paying the dividends hoped for. Perhaps these were lone comments, perhaps its a more widely held sentiment. Personally, I still think the choice of mesh vendor matters a lot.

But I think such comments also signal a maturing viewpoint in the market. Just as the city consumer POV is maturing, with a greater ability to parse through the marketing language to determine those criteria that are really important for a buyer to know, so too the maturing mesh equipment industry is getting more adept at understanding how this equipment works (and doesn't) and how it can provide value to cities. The industry is represented by such firms as BelAir, Cisco, Motorola, Nortel, SkyPilot, Strix, and Tropos (there are more, but I mean to offer a representative, not comprehensive list here).

I'm impressed by the progress and energy I see at each vendor, but my point is that all of these companies continue to tweak their product line, showing incremental improvement which, while not to be sniffed at, is still missing a certain something. I think that the beginning moves by some to integrate application technologies will provide that missing element - it's a good thing for the industry if vendors start moving towards a goal of offering a more complete solution to service providers and cities.

They're showing definite progress, but still have a long way to go, and without help from the federal government to spring them from the 2.4 GHz spectrum ghetto, where their products will continue to suffer from a crowded spectrum band with line-of-sight restrictions, they will continue to fight a lonely battle to make their products more bullet-proof and sustainable. In the meantime, the path to differentiation may lie in application integration, where they have more control over their value offering. I hope that all will put more emphasis on developing specific industry vertical solutions in the year to come, which I believe will pay off for the select number of vendors who lead that effort.

3. The lack of service provider availability may lead the smaller cities to take a serious look at alternatives to the Public Private Partnership model. When you put these trends together (maturing mesh capabilities, maturing city awareness, and lack of service provider options) the arrow points to more self-sufficiency on the part of cities. The fewer options a city has, the bolder it may get - watch for some cities to figure out that they can put a network in on their own and then find an operator or service provider partner down the road, if they ever decide they need to do that - call it the latest version of the "Corpus Christi model." The municipally-owned debate in statehouses and Congress from back in 2005 may have inhibited some city-owned projects and given a shot to the Public Private Partner model, but those issues are fading, so let's watch for change.

And as we continue to watch large players like ATT, Microsoft, and Google dance around the topic of municipal wireless, look for sustaining activity. Lots of attention has been given to ATT this past month, with the Napa and St. Louis announcements, but a friend who attended the ATT presentation told me that there was some chill in the room. He concluded that ATT is clearly very selective about finding a city that is in a market that will allow them to exploit their network presence and drive traffic to their Cingular network, which is their cash engine. They're not fond of RFPs, either. I think we'll be waiting a while longer for a big player to enter.

4. New consultants will take time before they will be able to offer significant value to the market. Perhaps this is the one line item that should really be read with a grain of salt, because MetroNetIQ competes here, and we've seen lots of cities get not so good deals from consultants. Several factors combine to create a long learning curve for consultants in this space: lots of moving parts on the technology solution; the industry is more complex than it appears at first blush; there are any number of Byzantine intrigues at work at any one time; signficant hype cycle noise to sift through; shifting solutions make new technology options available.

5. More and more cities can be expected to get funding and start projects in the next 6-9 months. At some point, we knew this would happen. People have reached the stage where they've studied enough, and they need to start a project. The early adopters have gone through some budget cycles and come out on the other end with the green light to start spending on a project. When that happens, the whole risk equation changes and the buyer gets more serious.

As I said in a previous post while at the conference last week, as more cities enter into this market, the market dynamics will shift. There will be a lag period where experienced consultants and service providers will be harder to find. There are just so many projects that Earthlink and Civitium have the resources or time to do, so the dynamics of a conventional solution will change. Cities will either pay a premium price to get the best, wait in line until one comes available, go down market to a second tier of consultants and / or providers, or go out on their own. There are just so many options for a city in a tight supplier market.

Of course, one other aspect of this trend is that as demand by cities becomes more and more certain, the market can be expected to respond by adding capacity, and we'll see even more consultants, but also service providers, network operators, and system integrators. We should expect that options (supply) expands along with demand, although there will always be some lag time, which puts a premium on acting faster than the city next door if you seek to have a full array of options to choose from.

6. Cities may opt to avoid an RFP and go with a single source provider with a well-documented business case. Just because we have started out with a preponderance of city-led RFP deals, doesn't mean we have to continue that way. Even though procurement guidelines favor a competitive bid scenario for most city officials, there is some wiggle room with creative approaches, and more cities will show us the way to accelerate past burdensome and expensive procurement processes. Personally, I'm all for building a good sound political and business case for a vendor selection, but I challenge the RFP that is used just to buttress a decision already made. If a clear winner is apparent before an RFP, I hope more cities will find a way to cut a deal, document their fair dealings, and eliminate the noise of an unattractive or uncompetitive RFP.

7. Applications will become more and more the buzz in this industry. There is just no getting around the fact that these networks are tools for cities to use in order to accomplish their core missions. While there will be continued discussion about Digital Divide, Ubiquitous Broadband, and Rural Broadband, where access is the be-all and end-all, the more sophisticated or focused cities will hone in on one or more ctirical broadband applications, like AMR, public safety apps, and mobile field data apps, build a business case, and go for it. Look for well-thought out projects that highlight one or more key applications. A comprehensive solution with clear payback for one or more applications may appear preferable to a general purpose network heavily reliant on a private partner to make money on retail ISP revenues.

We will also get more field data this year, which should prove revealing on how well these networks stand up to the tasks of providing the transport function for critical municipal digital applications - some good, some bad. The good data will be a press agent's dream and will be hawked to encourage more cities to enter, while the bad data will have the dual role of teaching the market what works and what doesn't, but also of providing a damper, slowing things down and driving a lot of the hype out. Thank Goodness. The hype is one thing that is growing tiresome for me, as it raises unrealistic expectations!

The bottom line comment? I'm bullish on industry growth and predict stronger than average growth of municpal wireless projects in
- smaller cities
- more isolated cities
- cities in proximity to a current muni wireless project
- cities with a well-focused application / solution
- cities that own an electric utility
- and cities that host a college or university

Finally, I'd encourage MuniWireless and MicroCast to focus more on application integration at future conferences. Imagine a staged exchange between city representatives on one side of the room and mesh and equipment vendors on the other side - that's a dialogue I'd love to have a ringside seat at.

Posted on March 11, 2007 at 08:15 AM | Comments (0)

Deployment Best Practices

This session sponsored by Cisco Systems provided four speakers that talked about their experience in public broadband deployment. Here they are. I enjoyed this session, lots of good info.

1. Eric Dentler, Wireless Specialist for Cisco Systems
2. Dennis Holmes, Director of Wireless Services, Outsource, Inc.
3. Bob Phelps, Mayor, City of Farmers Branch, TX
4. Ray Cagle, COO, Kite Networks

1. Eric Dentler, Wireless Specialist for Cisco Systems

Eric has prodigious experience in this field. Formerly with Pronto, Air Magnet, and most recently, with Aptilo, Eric is now with Cisco, which I take as evidence of Cisco's hiring. Good Job, Cisco!

"Innovation" has become a buzzword, perhaps "the" buzzword in this space. The five primary deployment models for these networks are as follows: 1) Mixed Use; 2) City-Owned; 3) Ad-Based & Monthly Subscriber; and 4) Specialized netoworks (these migrate to Mixed Use). (Isn't it interesting to see how different people define this industry and the business models?).

Quote of the day, so far: "With Mesh Networks, you are building bridges, so when you go down this path, be sure to look for staying power."

Cisco provides its Service Providers with "Calculator Tools" to measure revenue collection from a mesh network.

Here is the Prescription for Success:
- Take a fresh look, don't recycle an old RFP!! Please!
- Focus on a good End-to-End solution, not a cheap solution
- Look for a regional advantage
- Imagine 1% net new jobs from a wireless deployment
- Look at TCO - total cost of ownership - seek longevity and staying power
- Define the service levels you need
- Calculate the cost of Free
- Envision city micro subsidies, whcih tie wireless system (and capabilities) to city goals

2. Dennis Holmes, Director of Wireless Services, Outsource, Inc. - Dennis provided a more technical focus to his presentation.

3. Bob Phelps, Mayor, City of Farmers Branch, TX - Mayor Phelps gave a testimonial on his personal experience about his wireless project (he's been mayor for 11 years!).

4. Ray Cagle, COO, Kite Networks - This company is seeking to establish a national footprint but with "local sensitivity," by way of participation in municipal wireless projects and through its work with Sprint Broadband. Interesting.

Deployments planned, underway, or complete include Tempe (40 Sq. Mi), ASU (campus deployment), Farmer's Branch, TX (12 SqMi), Longmont, CO (22 SqMi), Yuma, Chandler, and Gilbert, all in AZ.

Be sure to get these slides and look at the one entitled "Assessing an Opportunity" - this is a key slide with criteria to determine if there is a fit between the city and the private partner. While this tool is for the assessment of a city, city officials shold find this helpful b/c it shows you what the vendor is looking for.

Factors that drive a network's viability include 1) population; 2) density; 3) size of network / project; 4) terrain; 5) costs; 6) municipal asset disposition; and 7) Return on Investment. Also, you'll want to assess a) the goals of the municipality; b) key stakeholder players and roles; c) details and costs of network; d) vertical assets; e) backhaul and fiber access; and f) business model.

Finally, think about the power company and the need for both power to the nodes, but also the right to attach to the streetlights. There will be decorative pole issues, as well as the potential need to stabilize existing poles.

Posted on March 05, 2007 at 02:46 PM | Comments (0)

Official Conference Kick Off, Houston & Earthlink Share With Us

Gary Bolles (MicroCast) and Esme Vos (MuniWireless), our conference organizers, launched the conference this morning to a full room of apporximately 300 (400?) attendees.

Esme began by highlighting the difference between this year's MuniWireless Texas 07 and the MuniWireless Atlanta 06 conference,. Bottom LIne: We've Come a Long Way, Baby!!

- Last year, the municpal bans of 2005 were still out there and fresh, and now, the tide has turned and a bill is in front of the Pennsylvania Legislature to roll back the ban they passed in 2005.

- Incumbents entering the market: AT&T is getting active, with projects in Riverside, CA; and recently announced in Napa, CA; and St. Louis, MO.

- Large city networks launching, witness Digital Houston.

- Wi Fi / Mobile Phone convergence is underway - this will save users big money, when users route a call using Skype or something similar - call made at no cost, no cellular minutes. Why do muniicpal employees need to use a cellular network if they have a municipal network.

- The wireless LANs being built will bring more and more benefits and the EcoSystem will keep growing.

Here follows a presentation of the Houston CIO Richard Lewis, on Houston's deal with Earthlink.

City of Houston Perspective

Richard Lewis is the CIO of the City of Houston. Be sure to look for the PowerPoint slides on MuniWireless.com. These are good slides!

Wireless Networks are an important Public Policy Issue - big deal for cities because of the assets to electric utility assets, and broadband is a critical infrastructure now for cities, similar to elecric grid and water supply.

Houston is unique because the project was initiated by a busines group, which in August 2004 published a white paper on the importance of ubiqutous, affordable broadband. That gave the city political cover, to be responsive to a group, rather than the initiator.

The RFP came out in October 2005, and just last month Earthlink was awarded the project. The project had these objectives:

1. Reduce field data costs and improve access options.
2. Digital Divide
3. Increase Consumer Choice and Lower Prices
4. Promote Economic Devleopment

Public Private Partnership is their model, where the city leverages its private real estate holdings to help a private party make a business case and an investment in the city.

Multiple applications will ride on the network. Houston has a long way to go: Corpus Christi currently has 23 wireless applications, where Houston currently has two.

Evaluation Criteria for the Respondents:

Value to the Community 25%
Value to City Government 10%
Financial Capacity 10%
Experience 30%
Deployment Strategy and Plan 25%
MW/DBE P/F

June 2009 is the projected date for project completion - hold on to your hats!

Five proposals were received in May 2006, with the two highest rated proposers invited in for negotiations: Earthlink and Convergent Broadband, a local consortium led by former Houston Lighting and Power CEO Don Jordan. Only a few weeks ago, February 13, the City announced that they had picked Earthlink as the most experienced provider to go forward with. This process served the city well.

The city used an investment banking firm to help them with the negotiations. They started with 10 key deal terms, but they didn't conclude negotiations until all deal items had reached conclusion. Earthlink was selected based on the following points.

1. Finance - they offered a Cash deal v. the highly leveraged deal offered by Convergent
2. Project Management Plans and Staffing - Earthlink plans were for an on-site management team, which they had already formed.
3. Earthlink would Finance, Design, Build, and Operate the Network at its Sole Expense.

Some other aspects of their deal:

City committed to a minimum bandwidth purchase of $500,000/year, for 4,000 users (out of a total 22,000 municipal employees). Lewis believes that as applications go up, that minimum will rapidly be dwarfed.

Earthlink will provide quarterly project management briefings to the city's project team.

Richard Lewis wrapped up the presentation with one question, an easy one, thank goodness!

How Big? 408 square miles of coverage is anticipated, making this the largest network out there!

Earthlink Perspective

Finally, Earthlink VP Janet West (VP Access Sales and Marketing) concluded by providing the Earthlink perspective, not only on the City of Houston deal, but also on the industry opporunity in general. Luckily, as my battery ran dead, Esme Vos provided a good recap on her website here.

Posted on March 05, 2007 at 09:23 AM | Comments (0)

Impressions on Muni Wireless

It's Day Two, waiting for the Main Session to begin at 9:00 am. First impressions - well attended, one thing that stands out from last year - really stands out - many of the city staff I met last night have more sophistication, and they have money and budgets for their projects. We couldn't say this a year ago.

It appears we're moving out of the investigative stage, at least for some of these cities, into the active stage - the question last night had to do with head-scratching, with city officials wondering how they can best start their project, how to spend the money they have budgeted.

The general mood among the industry cognoscenti, and that was a fun part of yesterday evening, is that things are more and more real.

One question is the availability of expertise: with so many projects about to happen, where will the talent come from to guide these projects?

And another one - smaller towns getting together to collaborate and make their projects larger, and thus, more attractive to a private partner.

Session is about to start, that is all for now!

Posted on March 05, 2007 at 08:54 AM | Comments (0)

MuniWireless Texas 07 Kicks Off!!

MicroCast Executive Gary Bolles kicked off the Wireless 101 opening session today to a full room - my guess is about 100 people! - I was surprised at the level of participation at what is essentially a conference-opening seminar to provide some new and some remedial education on Wireless Broadband.

Gary asked the audience what topics we wanted to cover.
Here's the list they came up with: 1) Wireless Application Integration; 2) Business Models / Public Private Partnership; 3) WorkArounds of Telco and local providers/using them for backhaul; 4) Municpal Requirements; 5) Sites, Rollouts.

Gary urged the group to consider a holistic business model, with issues running a spectrum of options, with such items as financing, operations, network design, etc.

A holistic architecture features a variety of technologies - what I tend to call a "vegetable soup" - where the different technologies bring different benefits to the network.

A holistic ecosystem of public and private entities are emerging to make up a new industry.

There followed a number of speakers...this is real-time blogging, and they are moving fast, so please forgive my typos, etc...Can't find a fresher blog, folks!

Business Models - Glenn Strachan

Glenn's background comes from working overseas in the Developing World, building wireless networks in Africa and Eastern Europe. He built the first country-wide network in Macedonia, for instance.

Non-profit Organization Model - using a new organization to create, fund, and manage the network provides flexibility in funding and pricing, among other things. Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Boston.

Cooperative Model - Geek-led, weave together grass roots access points into complex FREE networks.

Contracting Out Model - hands off approach in exchange for discounted services. Cerritos, Madison

Advertising Model - using ads to support the costs of the network. Annapolis

Public-Private Partnership Model - the most popular model by far, the public entity seeks a private partner to cooperate on a network project. San Francisco, Philadelphia, Rhode Island, Macedonia

Glenn focused some on his experience with Macedonia, where Internet penetration use grew in a year from 4% to 14% in a year.

Over 300 RFPs processed in the past 12 months.

Municipal Model - City owned and operated. Chaska, Corpus Christi

Government Loan-Grant Model - in favor for rural broadband solutions...

Other Models: Educational Purposes Model, Off-Peak v. Peak; Free Residential/Fee for Commercial-Govt, etc.

Cost Savings potential for a city of 40K population - $1.2 M!! Including ...
Pub Safety 72K
Schools and T-1 Lines 120K
Muni Backhaul - 50K

The Role of the Nonprofit - Anne-Marie Fowler, SeaKay

SeaKay's slogan is "Opportunity. Broadband. Everyone." Fowler focused on what a non-profit does well - it is entrepreneurial, more than non-profit-like...a success enabler with the community in mind. If the network is more profitable, the penetration increases. Non-profit brings focus to the project, acting in a bridge role. I like this one " the non-profit is the dash of salt in the soup"... business modeling, finance modeling, consensus building, facilitation, economic development, service learning (to educate parties to the network).

Rather than keep a non-profit as an afterthought, consider what adding a non-profit to the mix to bring in more versatility to the project. They can open up new opportunities and perspectives. Adding social goals requires financial profitability, ironically, the non-profit ensures the finanicial soundness of projects, so that there is money to fund the social goals.

Some shared objectives of non-profits and for-profits: Coverage Ubiquity and Customer Ubiquity
Local Relevance and Sustainability
Cutting Edge Technology that Works
Open Markets

The SeaKay Network Model, was next, where Anne-Marie elaborated on the Portfolio Theory, demonstrated here with one of those flower-shaped graphics, showing that putting a basket of different assets together is a key way to manage revenue risks, something a non-profit can help a city do - put philanthropic, private, and public revenue sources together.

Seakay's Digital Opportunity Initiative - all technology users are customers and should be treated as such!

Applications - Ken DiPietro, NextGen Communications

There is no one right business model for a network - but, there are a bunch of bad ones.

Stay away from Kbs - that's 20th Century - need to think about Mbs, even Gbs. Focus on several years into the future to futureproof your network.

Good list of high-bit rate applications - Get this!

Higher Initial Investment = Greater Return (and Future Proofing!)

The Future is Here and more is coming on fast: YouTube / Video on Demand & Business quality VOIP --- and see Joost, a new video-on-demand service as the next Napster, which will bring huge demands on networks...and also, Polycom's RPX HD - Real Presence Experience and High Definition) see Polycom's application

Business Model, Applications, and Network Design are all tightly entertwined.

Wireless Mesh Network Design - Drew Lentz, Meshtek

Overview of technology currently available...Mesh Networks have evolved to provide more value:

Generation 1: Single Radio & Frequency
Generation 2: Dual Radios & Frequencies
Generation 3: Multiple Radios & Frequencies, Dedicated Bandwidth

This analysis showed a preference for more and more complicated equipment...one challenge I'm familiar with, which I believe a planner should balance and that Drew finally brought up, is the cost per node and its impact on overall network budget. You will always need to balance technology capability with requirements (how you want to use the network) with equipment and operating costs, to find the balance that works for you.

Generation 4 will be exciting - single chassis with modular design, and you can BYOB - bring your own bandwidth - WiMAX and Wi Fi will play complementary roles in this new industry, not a case of either - or. I agree, they will co-exist and provide different functions, because both technologies have their own strengths - combined, they are better than separate.

Community-Based Networks - Ash Dyer, MIT/Cambridge, MA

Bring Your Own Router - the Socialist Perspective :)

Super Geeks teach a city how to do networking. Very energetic and passionate presentation!

In turns of cost allocation for connectivity, out of a $40 Broadband bill, $15 is for last-mile access, $16 is for Metro-access - most of the costs are local...

Bring serious capacity into injection points, then use ad-hoc mesh nodes - plug and play. That is the theory. *(From my conversations, there is considerable complexity remaining in network configuration, deployment, and operations, even with Meraki nodes - we are not there yet, IMHO - I think these home-grown community networks, which look good on paper, require a sophisticated user base to work - I'll continue to think so until convinced otherwise - Comments?).

Good model for consensus building! Get this...

I like this one - technology and network support, leverage high school students, volunteers, and/or outsourced firms or city departments.

Digital Inclusion - Karen Archer Perry, Karacomm

How will the community benefit? With public involvement comes the expectation of community benefit...

Leaders need to step up and communicate that the service windows are going away and that everything is going on-line...

Access, Affordability, and Appicability (aka access, speed, digital literacy, and equipment)

On Access: Pew Center says 68% of Americans use the Internet, but the population is off-line tends to be minorites, seniors, disadvantaged...so these factors need to go into program design.

Network Speed is uneven ... 42% have high-speed Internet, but that's under 200 Kbs...when speed/dollar is measured, we stink in terms of value for broadband...

Application Use and Relevance varies widely across user groups.

PC Availability mirrors general ICT access - have to keep in mind also, the age of the PC, because functionality declines with age!

For Success in Digital Inclusion -
First: Vision, Plan, Programs, & Partners
Then: Implement, Evaluate, & Extend

Contract Considerations - Jim Baller, The Baller Herbst Law Firm

Legal Issues are very important ... contracts are new and still being tried out...

Jim gave a fast-paced review of regulatory and legal issues - too complex to cover here - SORRY! His website is a great resource, by the way, so check it out!.

That's all folks - laptop battery going dead, have to go look for an electric outlet...Wish there was wireless electricity, only if Tesla had lived longer...sighh.

Posted on March 04, 2007 at 04:38 PM | Comments (0)

Small is Good, Simple is Better

This is what gives the Internet its vitality. Complexity is a barrier to entry and simplicity, with the ability to survive mistakes allows experimentation and discovery. The Web was created by one guy in a basement trying out an idea. One of millions - and it is only a hint of what is to come. Bob Frankston, from his comments in the Broadband Connectivity Competition Policy Workshop (Feb 25, 2007)

What if high-speed Internet went everywhere you went? That, Bob Frankston argues, is the real future and next evolutionary step of the Internet, not broadband! Making access speeds faster and faster, but keeping its distribution limited to where it already is, serves the existing incumbents, but doesn't serve society. It's an intriguing argument, counter to the agenda of the reigning telecom, cable, and government elites. To maintain their business model, Frankston says, large broadband providers require continuing protection from the FCC and the government, thus their devotion of tremendous resources to lobby state and federal governments and maintain the status quo.

The value of municipal wireless is that it is a relatively cheap, modular, and functional technology that fosters experimentation and learning and challenges the prevailing wisdom. It's good enough to provide basic connectivity, so it's available for cities to experiment with. That's the origin of my catchphrase: "Small is Good, Simple is Better." I believe that small cities are a key to unlocking the secrets as well, because this experimentation is more likely to happen where the motivation is strongest, out in the sticks in Small Town, Rural America.

In the face of rapidly changing technology, it makes sense to engage in a massive amount of rapid experiments, which provide lessons to all of us and move an entire industry forward. Rather than make very large experiments that unfold very slowly (e.g., Verizon's fiber roll outs) in urban areas that already have decent connectivity options, large numbers of cities can deploy numerous Hot Zones using a variety of combinations of technologies and then provide feedback to each other for the development of an alternate telecom paradigm, based on a very large number of self-empowered, open-minded emergent laboratories.

By keeping the deployments small, rapid deployment becomes possible. By keeping network design and objectives simple, we can isolate what goes wrong and improve on the process in the next round of deployments. It's as if we all were research scientists. But Small and Simple runs counter to what you will hear when you watch an ATT advertisement, where they will tell you that because telecom is so complex, you need a very large - global- company to manage it. What the heck, I'd do the same thing if I were ATT, it's their best argument to play to their strengths and highlight what makes them different. As rational as that is for ATT, it's not the direction that technological change points us to, according to Frankston.

Frankston argues that an alternate paradigm is to leverage new network technologies to make telecom distributed and locally controlled, in order to keep it simple and spread it everywhere very fast. With that approach, you don't need the size and capital of telecom companies. You let the technologies of the Internet and the very nature of networking work their magic. He says that telecom companies control the industry so it will evolve in a way that favors their continued dominance. It's a powerful argument, but one that requires you to throw away much of the dogma that you grew up with.

Imagine if we all paid low, low rates for broadband access? In fact, what if the rates were so low that they could be disregarded, covered by corporate sponsors and advertising? The practical person would object, saying that somebody has to pay for all that infrastructure. Sure, there is an initial capital bump, Frankston acknowledges, but the new paradigm eliminates the massive amounts of service fees we all pay - check your monthly telecom bill - and that would free up tremendous budget for consumers to spend on what they really want - applications and content. It's a redistribution of spending, and that is my long-term vision for telecommunciations and metropolitan broadband. I think that there will be some telecoms that get this, probably the smaller, more motivated companies.

It's refreshing to read Bob Frankston's long-form commentary, if mind-boggling and a little daunting, because he says much the same thing in his commentary available by clicking here. Before you stop reading because I must be insane, I urge you to follow through and read this essay, but leave your assumptions about some of your most fundamental beliefs on hold for a while - suspend your disbelief - because this is what Municipal Wireless is really good for - to challenge the prevailing conventional wisdom, which has the impact of pushing out the envelope for all of us and opening up new possibilities.

But be sure you're able to concentrate when you take on this task, because even though Bob writes well, he takes the reader on a long tour. It's fascinating to look at the telecom world through his perspective, because for him, a pioneer in computers and networking, what a long strange trip it must have been. He highlights new technologies and the wonder of the Internet, which demand a new paradigm. Following that thread, he declaims the very need for telecommunications companies, which rely on government-enforced scarcity to keep service revenues high, to maintain their large infrastructures and expensive business models. They say - "if you want us to build the new broadband infrastructure, we need incentives in the form of market protection to continue our revenue streams, so we can raise and spend the billions of dollars that will be necessary." An alternate approach is to try another way and let the market drive us to the best solution. Let's not put all of our eggs in one basket.

It was a similar argument that led to the creation of the public power industry in the early parts of the 20th Century. President Franklin Roosevelt's admiinistration fostered the development of public power in part to prevent private entitites from capturing control of all our nation's rivers, which would then be used to generate cheap hydropower. They also wanted the government to have insider access to the true costs of producing electricity, to ensure that large private companies didn't charge too much money to the detriment of consumer interests. Local governments today can provide the same countering balance of consumer protection from large broadband providers with municipal wireless.

To many, this must seem a heresy, but Frankston challenges us all to think in new ways about how we communicate, given the amazing potential of the Internet and the rapid pace of change in the technology world.

It's the 21st Century, after all. Time to put on your thinking cap and Open Your Mind to New Possibilities. Long live diversity, new frontiers, and the free market!

Posted on March 03, 2007 at 07:13 AM | Comments (0)

Meet MetroNetIQ, Raise Your Network IQ, Feed Your Head

In a couple of days, I'll be hitting the highway, driving up to Dallas to attend the MuniWireless Texas 07 Conference. I've been focusing on local business in Central Texas for the past year, so I've been off the conference circuit since last year's Digital Cities in Houston in March. Hard to believe that it's been a year since then.

I'm looking forward to the conference: it has a good agenda of events, and there is some excitement in the air this year about municipal wireless ... and, it will be nice to see all my old friends and associates in this little industry.

Blogger's Oath
I, John Cooper, do hereby promise to blog faithfully during the upcoming conference and post frequent blogs - even if its a halfway legible meandering posting - it will be timely!

Aware that I'll meet new people, hopefully lots of city officials ready to kick off a project, I thought I would cull some of my best material for those readers who may be hitting this website for the first time. Here's my informal Best of MetroNetIQ below. There are over 400 posts on this blog, so this is but a sample, but if you just check these out, you should enjoy the conference more. So scan these items to get a quick grasp of municipal wireless issues and other deep stuff.

I urge you to check out the START HERE!! sections on either side of the website homepage. These will give you a quick overview of the website, and then you can just hop around. There's a lot to keep you busy!

Check out this document first, which provides a good overview of the industry and the value propostion of municipal wireless: MetroNetIQ Explains Metropolitan Broadband.

To understand the potential of radio and wireless in general, I'm particularly fond of this whitepaper from Kevin Werbach, a former senior staffer with the FCC, entitled Radio Revolution. You will be a genius on the arcane aspects of wireless after you digest this, making you very impressive at cocktail parties! Meet new friends and influence people with your newfound knowledge of radio spectrum!

This whitepaper written nearly two years ago provides my analysis of the structural changes in our economy and in telecommunications in tthe past few years, which are driving new opportunities like municipal wireless: UnwireMyCity on Structural Change

I especially like this Planning Document post - Planning and Engagement: A MetroNet in Ten Easy Steps - written nearly two years ago, but updated February 5, 2006. It provides these 10+2 steps for would-be MetroNet city officials to kick off a MetroNet project.

1. Get informed on metropolitan broadband technology options.
2. Evaluate your community needs regarding broadband services.
3. Produce and file a preliminary plan to make government policymakers aware of your actions and intentions.
4. Get on the same page with other community leaders with a Regional Collaboration Event.
5. Launch a Pilot Program.
6. Broaden your community base of support.
7. Determine your business model.
8. Prioritize the implementation of broadband applications that will become available from your new MetroNet.
9. Determine a funding strategy.
10. Spread the word in your community.
11. Launch your plan, use someone else's network, build your network.
12. Enjoy the benefits and brag on your success.

Next, I recommend this post from September 2005, What's In Store for Community Broadband?, which covers my keynote address at a PTI seminar on Wireless and has my assessment of Why and How Community Broadband will happen. Check it out 18 months later and see how accurate I was. You can access the Powerpoint slides and text here as well.

Stay tuned and read my coverage of the upcoming conference, and if you want to talk about getting a network started in your town, drop me a line by clicking here!

Posted on March 02, 2007 at 04:36 PM | Comments (0)

To RFP, or Not to RFP, That is the Question

Going back to where I started, I've always been a proponent of open, competitive bidding processes in the public arena. Call me old-fashioned but, as awkward and messy as public reviews of proposals can sometimes be (and we've not really seen many messy ones outside San Francisco), there's a lot to be said for open, competitive bidding when conducting the public's business. Taxpayers like to see their tax dollars well-spent and, although there may be some efficiencies in single-vendor negotiations, it's hard to say without seeing the kinds of proposals a competitive bidding process brings in. Carol Ellison Commentary on MuniWireless.com

This commentary was elicited by recent announcements that AT&T has cut deals with the City of Napa, CA (12 sq mi network) and St. Louis - see City of Napa and AT&T Announce Wi-Fi Agreement.

AT&T is one of the largest telecom companies in the world, so there is heightened interest in any steps they take to enter into this little niche market. What I find more interesting is that AT&T rejects following the RFP model that has developed over the past three years. They are showing good sense, in my opinion. The debate I find interesting is whether or not a city should go out for an RFP.

It is interesting to compare these two options. The rules associated with an RFP raise the risks for bidders, who may not offer their best price, since they include risk margins to cover what they don't know, and they anticipate a negotiation on the back end. The RFP may work as planned, creating a competitive market dynamic and driving down prices. But it may not as well, its a roll of the dice. On the other hand, if there is a great relationship between a company and a city, with good alignment, characterized by trust and openness and a mutual desire to do a deal, a well-run negotiation should help both parties get to a win-win that is superior to an RFP.

I put much of this discussion on the question of whether or not to go out for a bid under the title: "City, Know Thyself." (with apologies to the Greeks, where the phrase "Know Yourself" appeared on the Temple of Apollo at Delphi).

The first question to ask if you are pondering your options is "What does the city want?" - does it look more like a private sector infrastructure investment in the city or a package of services to be purchased from a private sector vendor? If it looks more like the former, then there is considerable flexibility for the city and good options for negotiating a win-win. If it is the latter, then the city should develop its needs list and see how well it can get its needs met in the marketplace.

The answer to the RFP question hinges on two other major issues: first, how attractive will the city offer be to draw in quality responses (demand)? second, how many quality vendors are likely to bid (supply)? Also at stake is the political attitude inside the city. While a city may be in the habit of bidding everything over a certain amount, to remain above political reproach, there is a cost attached to that mentality, making an RFP a more expensive proposition and a cumbersome way to engage in commerce, which may not produce the desired results.

I think that the framework used to look at a municpal wireless project matters as well. Does the city want a network for municipal applications, indicating that it will be a major consumer of broadband services? How large is the potential market demand in the city v. the potential cost of the network - i.e., will the project yield a good business case for the potential bidders in the RFP?

If the city wants a network primarily to have a network as an economic development badge of honor, on the other hand, it has less to offer, but can still put out feelers and engage in a discussion with potential partners to develop the project in the absence of an RFP. In this case, the municpal wireless project looks more like a hotel development, a factory relocation, or a headquarters relocation.

A private sector company may consider making an investment in a community and seek to find out what support it can get from the city to help it make its decision. We are all familiar with this model, and nobody would suggest that a city, approached by a company that indicates a desire to locate a factory in the city, should go out to RFP to consider other offers. In a similar vein, a private sector WISP may approach a city with an offer to install a network and wish to explore any commitments the city may make to help the WISP with its decision. But the comparison suffers somewhat, because it is unlikely that there will be a second network anytime soon, but a second factory could easily locate in the city.

So, I believe that the alternative of a sole-source, non-bid tender may have a lot to offer cities and should get more attention this year.

1. It can save money for the city if it avoids the time and expense of the RFP.
2. A project can be negotiated and launched in the same time it would take to prepare an RFP - a sole source can accelerate the timeline of a project.
3. A vendor should be willing to make significant concessions in a sole source arrangement, in exchange for avoiding the competitive risks and expenses of an RFP response. Just ask any vendor who has made a short list, but ended up second place in a bid. They are not often eager to go through that process again, and should be quite motivated to sole source a bid when the opportunity arises.

Who should consider a sole-source arrangement?

1. You are constrained from building the network yourself (i.e., lack access to capital, etc.)
2. Your city is smaller and less attractive to private sector WISPs. (slow growth, small size, hilly environment, etc.)
3. Your city government is not a large consumer of broadband services.
4. You currently have a relationship with a strong private partner that you trust.
5. You are under time or political pressure to get a project underway.

If many of these conditions describe your city, I would urge you to work with a consultant like MetroNetIQ to evaluate your options in the near term. Consultants are well connected and in a position to identify a private sector provider who may have interest - we can acti as a matchmaker of sorts. A little time and money spent in evaluating your options well ahead of actually engaging in an RFP may reveal that there are more options available than you originally thought. You may discover that there is a well-aligned partner who would be motivated to negotiate and make an investment in the community if a bid were to be avoided.

In the end, an RFP is only one way to go forward. Cities should examine their options and consider their needs in detail. An independent sounding board like a consultant makes sense. It may be that your project looks much more like an economic development opportunity, with a private company willing to bring good assets to the city - that would argue for a two-way negotiation without an RFP. If it looks from the start more like an IT procurement, however, the city should begin the requirements development process immediately, in advance of an RFP.

An RFP will remain an opportunity for the city, at wherever stage it is at in a project, but the costs of a formal procurement should be weighed against the benefits. Remember to give the sole-source provider option more attention in 2007, and your odds for success will improve.

Posted on March 01, 2007 at 12:05 PM | Comments (0)