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With growing competition and continuous call for on the move connectivity, the need for fast, scalable, cost effective, and wireless networks to provide broadband connectivity is gaining ground in the Indian market. Given India's low level of broadband penetration and low investments into telecom infrastructure, need for wireless connectivity automatically resurges, specially in areas where last mile connectivity is not strong enough.

Wireless Benefits
In the present context, where proliferation of broadband is still limited to metros and specific regions, wireless technologies such as Wi-Fi can actually engender a blistering upward move where service providers are struggling to provide access through fixed lines only. Wi-Fi is an IEEE 802.11 specification-based wireless and short range technology that allows LAN to be deployed without cabling, thereby reducing the cost of network deployment. It enables consumers to share broadband connection with the convenience of anywhere connectivity within its circle. While implementation, Wi-Fi access network needs a backhaul network, which could be copper cable, WiMax or optic fiber. The technology, although disregarded initially by many experts doubting about its relevance in the Indian market, has brought forth enormous positive response from the enterprise segment, service providers, and the government in the past couple of years.

“Compared to all the wireless technologies, Wi-Fi offers the best price performance in the Indian context. Earlier, only laptops had Wi-Fi capability and now we have PDAs, mobile phones with Wi-Fi, and ultra mobile computers that would certainly fuel the need and the demand for Wi-Fi hotspots. Wi-Fi with wired Internet backhaul offers the best price performance for both service providers and customers,” says Jayesh Kotak, VP, Product Management, D-Link. The company is presently working with leading service providers like Tata Indicom to build Wi-Fi hotspots across India. The roll out so far is over 3,000 Wi-Fi access points. In addition, it is also focusing on draft N technology and unified wireless solutions for the mid to large deployments.

Even though WLAN adoption is still somewhat new in the Indian market, the enterprise wireless deployments have taken off in a significant way in verticals such as hospitality, retail, transport, and logistics.

The concept of Wi-Fi, if implemented properly, can also provide huge benefits to large sections of the rural population in the country where deploying a quality wire line broadband network is troublesome and costly for service providers and operators. Also, while public connectivity in the rural scenario can be taken care of with alternate technologies such as WiMax, Wi-Fi can play an important role in providing broadband applications, by taking the role of premises connectivity, say experts While the Indian market is deploying Wi-Fi networks based on 802.11a/b/g standards, the developing markets are shifting to 802.11n. It is expected that the 802.11n would reach a market share of 16% by 2013.

Exploring New Opportunities
With the continuous rise of the Indian corporate sector, demand for always-connected professionals undoubtedly increases. And the increased adoption of laptops and Wi-Fi enabled handheld devices paring the way for wireless technology in Indian enterprises that are looking to provide flexible modes of working environment in a wire free office ambience. The current market size of the Indian Wi-Fi market, as per a study by Wi-Fi Alliance is estimated to be over $270 mn and likely to grow to close to $900 mn by 2011-12. A major chunk of which is expected to be come from the enterprise segment.

Commenting on the relevance of Wi-Fi in Indian enterprises, N Hari, VP, Technology, Gemini Communications says, “It is not only the Indian enterprises but even the Indian retail segment that is looking up to Wi-Fi as a viable networking option. The technology is an ideal solution for Indian businesses not only as an indoor WLAN but also a mesh-based outdoor broadband connectivity catering to small business applications.”

Echoing similar insights, Neeraj Gulati, MD, Ciena India says, “The uptake of Wi-Fi in the enterprise segment drives more data usage as workers have more access to critical applications throughout the day, which drives the need for bandwidth to enterprise.”

Apart from adoption of portable computers, low levels of capex involved in achieving the connectivity and simplified infrastructure management are other significant reasons that make Wi-Fi a very attractive 'access' technology for enterprises. The market is also set to witness huge numbers of Wi-Fi enabled hotspots by 2009-10. Airports, railway stations, various educational institutes, and coffee shops are already taking steps toward providing wireless connectivity to end users. Campus wide Wi-Fi networks, according to experts, is a fascinating option for educational institutions where students can have Internet access through broadband anywhere within the campus.

“In wireless connectivity, the quality of service remains an issue. All stakeholders need to work together to provide consistent high quality service to end-consumers” Arun Gupta, group CTO Shoppers Stop	“Uptake of Wi-Fi in the enterprise segment drives more data usage as workers have more access to critical applications throughout the day this drives the need for bandwidth” Neeraj Gulati, MD, Ciena India	“It is not only Indian enterprises but also the Indian retail segment that is looking at Wi-Fi as a viable networking option” N Hari, VP, Technology, Gemini Communications.

In a strategic move to provide on- the-move high-speed connectivity to all DLF occupants and visitors, DLF, a leading real estate developer has recently announced that it will implement Wi-Fi across DLF buildings all over India. The services of which would be provided by O-Zone networks. The company is the first real estate company to adopt this technology.

In another noteworthy movement, Delhi High Court has also enters into agreements with MTNL to deploy Wi-Fi technology in its premises.

On a similar note, YOU Telecom has entered into a joint venture with Malaysia's Wi-Fi major Red Snapper (in which the Malaysian govrenment has 40% stake) in March 2008 to form YOU Snapper that will provide wireless as the last mile to its customers in India.

“It is really unsatisfactory that government and cellular companies are mesmerized with the 3G technology only. With the rapid increase in adoption of laptops and notebooks, Wi-Fi will be the technology to provide cheap and reliable connectivity, compared to others,” says Braham Singh, CEO, YOU Snapper. The company so far has deployed Wi-Fi in Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, and Pune areas successfully. With the help of its Wi-Fi services, YOU Telecom is planning to double its broadband subscriber base in the coming 18 months.

Clearly, corporate and service providers are preparing for a wireless ambience, which could shape up the existing complex wired infrastructure.

Technological Progress
With advancement of technology and continuous developments, the Wi-Fi market, according to industry experts, has reached its third generation, where more serious users are looking at controller-based enterprise-grade wireless LAN equipment. Notably, Wi-Fi implementations are chiefly based on standalone wireless routers and access points. Although, there are no tribulations such as spectrum allocation in case of deploying Wi-Fi technology, functioning in an unlicensed band can pose challenges to its interference. In addition, there are various hurdles, which could prevent an enterprise to go for a Wi-Fi technology.

According to Paramjit Puri, business development manager, Advanced Technologies, Cisco Systems, India & Saarc, “Although the presence of wireless deployments are increasing in a remarkable way, the government needs to clarify the bottlenecks that have arisen such as rationalization of tariffs, de-licensing of 2.4 Ghz devices to be restricted to 100 milliwatts of radiated power output, and effective policies for public hotspots.”

“In wireless connectivity, the quality of service remains an issue with frequent breakdowns. All stakeholders need to work together to provide a consistent high quality service to end consumers,” says Arun Gupta, group CTO, Shoppers Stop.

“Wi-Fi security standards like WPA2, WPA, EAP, and AES have made good progress during the past several years, and it is now possible to attain and maintain a strong WLAN defense. However, vulnerabilities will continue to occur” Nareshchandra Singh, principal research analyst, Gartner	“All wireless technologies have a different role to play in the Indian environment, and comparing them like apple to apple will not be very fruitful for the Indian broadband picture” Prasad Babu, director, System Engineering and Operations, Juniper Networks

Moreover, because of the wireless nature of the technology, people have raised major consideration over data security in a Wi-Fi enabled ambience. As maturity level of technology step-ups and concerns about security threats are attended by different levels of security mechanisms.

Commenting on the Wi-Fi security standards, Nareshchandra Singh, principal research analyst, Gartner, said “Wi-Fi security standards like WPA2, WPA, EAP, and AES have made good progress during the past several years, and it is now possible to attain and maintain a strong wireless LAN (WLAN) defense. However, vulnerabilities will continue to occur.”

“Through 2010, 90% of WLAN security incidents will be a result of misconfigured systems” he added.

Capt Raghu Raman, CEO, MSSG says, “Wireless networks are the best possible medium for hackers to get an easy ingress into secure enterprise networks. One needs to implement robust security mechanisms beyond default settings of access points to secure the network.”

Source:http://indianadigital. typepad.com

“The continuous efforts of monitoring and user education are main drivers for the success of wireless technologies such as Wi-Fi,” he adds.

On personal mobile device front, the biggest concern has been encryption, password protection, posture assessment, and access control and remote data wipe in the event of asset loss.

Interestingly, while security issues in wireless technologies have raised enough eyeballs in the past, we are now witnessing a trend where wireless networks are being deployed for purposes of security. Steps such as using complicated authentication mechanism like shared key authentication, VPNs, minimizing radio propagation in irrelevant areas are some of the key points taken care of to ensure security.

According to Prasad Babu, director, System Engineering and Operations, Juniper Networks, “Wi-Fi offers a great potential to Indian enterprises, where providing a fiber to every building is not feasible. However, lack of education and understanding the technology act as major roadblocks in its deployment.”

According to an estimation, by 2011, nearly 73% of businesses in North America will adopt Wi-Fi, while 17% will be connected by 3G, and the remaining 10% with WiMax, which itself shows the potential of this technology compared to all the latest wireless technologies. Compared to technologies such as WiMAX, GPRS, and 3G, Wi-Fi stands cost effective, easy to deploy, and flexible.

“However all wireless technologies have a different role to play in the Indian environment and comparing them like apple to apple will not be very fruitful for the Indian broadband picture,” adds Babu.

Clearly, technology comprehends a great potential and acceptance among the enterprise community; however, it is still dominated by the urban phenomenon and is yet to find the desired level of acceptance in tier-II cities. With the prices of laptops getting more competitive and the growing number of small and medium enterprises, the need for wireless technologies will certainly grow.

The continuous change in business environment is forcing businesses to adopt competitive standards of wireless connectivity. Therefore the technologies like Wi-Fi are poised to grow with time. Moreover, there are issues regarding security, lack of awareness, service providers capabilities, etc, that need to be overcome for successful adoption of technology in the various sectors.

Jatinder Singh
jatinders@cybermedia.co.in