Social and Strategic impacts
The WIP project is expected to have considerable strategic impact on the society and create new business opportunities. The vision and objectives of the Radio Internet are very similar to those of the Internet in its early stage of evolution: the architecture of the Internet grew as an unmanaged,
uncoordinated initiative that slowly led to a worldwide infrastructure capable of carrying new communication services following a new business model. Just imagine that tomorrow, pioneered by the all-wireless infrastructure developed in the WIP project, most of the communication services go over wireless networks.
The Radio Internet can change the way people communicate in multiple and radically different ways:
• Reduced infrastructure costs for customers: instead of one wired connection per access point, the Radio Internet will make use of a smaller number of larger capacity links to the wired Internet shared by all users. As the wireless interconnection grows, the cost per user decreases, because it is shared by more users and more communications are expected to remain inside the wireless interconnection which requires less capacity towards the fixed Internet.
• New cooperation models for the Radio Internet users, as an access point will need to relay traffic from other APs. Problems such as capacity sharing, authentication, reputation, and charging will have to be solved for the model to work. User requirements for building communities will support society relations.
• New economical models. The revenue of the last mile will not go to LECs, but device and AP vendors, server manufacturers, backbone ISPs, or to communities of users providing wirelessrelated services. This is an opportunity to introduce new pricing and charging models. New operators will be able to take advantage of the large number of APs that currently provide substantial underutilized bandwidth. The Radio Internet will encourage new business models for
the exchange of services and content over wireless networks.
• Easy deployability due to the self-configuration capabilities of the architecture and to a lower cost of the equipment shared by all users in a community. The self-organising mesh network technology will enable networks to become more robust and to adapt to changes. They will overcome technology differences, make today’s administration effort of network and service
providers obsolete, and handle different user roles, such as owner, client, friend, employee, business partner, or guest. Through WIP, a user or AP entering an all-wireless Internet domain can also act as a new network node (router) and therefore improve network connectivity. The network will automatically detect a new node and reconfigure itself.
• Scalability resulting from the decentralized management of the infrastructure and distributed self-management capabilities.
• Enabling the emergence of new applications in the areas of e-home, e-communities, etransport, e-security (cf., below).
• Enabling ubiquitous communication scenarios by assuming that users are intrinsically nomadic. They may travel through different domains and places (e.g. home, car, restaurants, airports, office) while communicating with different IP services via a variety of devices and heterogeneous networks. By introducing the mesh technology to increase coverage and performance, as well as self-organisation to reduce administration, the Radio Internet will allow nomadic users to take advantage of ubiquitous communications.
• Wider coverage and extreme robustness as any user may potentially become a part of the wireless interconnection. As the number of APs increases, the failure of a single AP will not impact the performance of the network. It will be less dependent on pre-installed and operated infrastructures to enhance network availability. By reducing human involvement in configuration tasks, it is possible to reduce possibilities for failures and human error, which often lead to security vulnerabilities.
The WIP project also represents an opportunity for the European research and industry to take the lead in Information and Communication Technologies, capitalizing on the area in which they always have been ahead of the pack: wireless communications. The history of innovation shows that major disruptive technologies have appeared as a by-product of the mainstream research or
when researchers looked at aspects “around-the-corner.” Such an approach is the rationale for the project – WIP wants to explore several key ideas that are radically different from the mainstream trend of the existing networks. This project believes that such a disruptive approach will radically change the future communication networks and provide technological advances to the European
industry.
Opportunities for SMEs and new business models
R&D within WIP will also create new business opportunities for SMEs. The technology developed will lower the threshold for SMEs to enter some sectors of the communication market: e-Public, networking solutions for home networks, municipality networks, and community networks. The approach chosen by WIP to develop a generic core technology for secure self-organising networks as a collection of building blocks, and to make it publicly available, will enable fair competition to enter a vertical market: SMEs will be able to focus on specific requirements for the vertical market and profit from the WIP generic core technology. A SME can repeat this approach to enter other vertical markets. Finally, the SME partners will have an opportunity to launch their own specific
security solutions.
Motivation for European research cooperation
The objectives of WIP are far too complex for a single organisation or a national research program to address. It requires different expertise (i.e., radio technology, networking, policy management, social, and legal) and different types of business background. For maximum impact, WIP sets up a strong European research project that enables close cooperation between players with supplementary expertise and different backgrounds, both business and cultural wise. Strong
European cooperation will strengthen Europe’s R&D position in wireless technologies and selforganisation of next generation ubiquitous networks. The results of WIP will impact a much larger set of R&D activities than what can be done by a single partner, for instance by promoting structuring research activities on wireless networking within European Research Areas (ERA).
Moreover, WIP will create opportunities for the partners to establish better business relationship (e.g., joint ventures or spin-offs).
New business opportunities
The application domains described above open an unlimited number of business opportunities in the area of services and communication infrastructures. When using the WIP technology, the entrance barrier for providers will be reduced due to smaller investments and customers may also earn credits for supporting providers by acting as a mobile router. Performance levels and production
costs can be improved by integrating the WIP technology into cards and embedded devices, which generates new business opportunities for chip and component manufacturers. All of them play a large role in the European economy.
New actors, not currently related to the telecommunication service value chain, can find business opportunities by providing network and services that add value to this chain (e.g., home and office, small enterprises, last mile network services). Many sectors whose traditional revenues come from
the supply of services to the home (e.g., safety companies, utilities, and telecare service providers) may eventually benefit from an advanced robust network and service provisioning due to massive deployment of radio nodes. The provision of such network services needs cooperation among these enterprises and traditional Telcos, but it will strengthen the competitiveness of all these companies.
The WIP technology will also help creating new business opportunities in automotive sector. The use of information technology to offer reliable networks and services to the driver and passengers of a vehicle encourages traditional service and content providers (e.g., gas stations, traffic information,
service providers, weather forecast, network operators) to participate by offering new value-added services.
