Empty Highway

The other possible scenario is that the Wi-Fi network is integrated in the next 5 years but people are not interested in using the available resources.

In 2005, the economic condition of the world is not going well. The reason is the weak economic condition of the United State of America. Since George W. Bush became the president of the U.S.A, U.S.A. government has had deficit budget that causes the economic condition of the U.S.A does not go well and US $ weakens. Since so many countries uses US $ for their reserve, while the US $ weakens, the countries’ reserves also decreases. Alan Greespan with US Fed has tried to improve the USA economic and strengthen US $ but so far, there has not yet significant improvement. US $ is still going to weaken, especially compare to euro.

As many other companies in the world, the bad world economic situation also creates trouble for the telecom companies, such as KPN in the Netherlands. They face big dilemma, on the one hand, they still have to increase its network to run their business. On the other hand, with this terrible economic condition, the telecoms companies need to save their money. Therefore, they try to look for other ways to expand their business but not require a lot of money.

Wi-Fi seems to be the answer of this searching. The cost of setting up Wi-Fi is much less expensive than doing it for wire infrastructure. Moreover, with the weak economy condition, wireless can be the cheap solution for the customers who want to have new internet connection. Wi-Fi is also so flexible to be used that people can use internet in every places with Wi-Fi connection. The telecom companies forecast that people’s mobilization will increase significantly in the future that people will love this technology.

Their other consideration is that the media devices companies, such as Sony, Toshiba, HP-Compaq, Samsung, Siemens, Sony-Ericsson, and Nokia, will invest in their R&D department for Wi-Fi technology because the telecom companies assume that these media device companies also have the same forecasting as them about the future of Wi-Fi. When so many available devices supported Wi-Fi technology, telecom companies assume that public will be attempted to update their devices with the new technology devices.

Therefore, the telecom companies decide to invest their money in the Wi-Fi business. They compete to develop their Wi-Fi network. Taking into account that there are some free wireless networks, which were built and run by some volunteer, in some cities, such as in Leiden, the telecom companies, such as KPN in the Netherlands, try to negotiate with these organizations to buy their available network. The reason is that it is cheaper and faster to buy the available network than to start everything from zero. The negotiation is successful since the volunteer are also too busy and tired to serve the customers freely that they choose to sell the whole network.

However, the devices companies, especially PDA and cell phone companies, such as Nokia, HP-Compaq and Siemens, have different consideration. With the slow economic growth, the companies decide not to continue or at least postpone the projects that have not given them big profit and focus on the development of their strong products. In these companies’ point of view, the Wi-Fi’s future is not yet clear. Moreover, there are still some lacks in the development of the products featuring Wi-Fi. For example, the active time duration of devices is so short when users use Wi-Fi.

In 2006, the economic condition still does not show good improvement. Furthermore, Alan Greenspan’s term in the Fed has finished since January 31, 2006. The market has not decided to trust his successor to lead US Fed. Therefore, there is no good signal from the US economic that also affects to the economic of the world.

This condition makes the telecom companies feel surer that their forecasting for the future of Wi-Fi is correct. As a result, they increase their investment by starting building their own Wi-Fi network. Most telecom companies have plan that every year the companies can increase the Wi-Fi network to be widen by around 30%. The telecom companies continue their competition to leverage their Wi-Fi network.

In 2007 and 2008, the Wi-Fi network is very wide but there are not many devices backed Wi-Fi technology. The available devices have high price and most of them are still not well connected between each other. Therefore, the media devices are still fragmented. With this condition, customers are discouraged from buying these devices and taking Wi-Fi package from telecom companies. What is worse, the customers also feel reluctant to use Wi-Fi due to its bad reliability and security problem.

The telecom companies start doubting their forecasting about Wi-Fi. Hence, as they have invested a lot of money in this project, they cannot directly stop this project. If the project stops, the companies will lose all of their expensive investment.

Having the same problem, many telecom companies start to be partner. They integrate their Wi-Fi network to share the cost of setting up new Wi-Fi network and make Wi-Fi more interesting for the customers for its wide area network.

Finally, in 2009, the telecom companies realize that their investment decision in Wi-Fi is a mistake. They do not get their Return On Investment (ROI), they even lost a lot of money from their huge investment in this project. They start trying to sell their network to the market and do a lot of saving within their companies. However, there are no customers want to buy this failed project.

Consequently, in 2010, there is a lot of telecommunication bankrupt and the executives of these companies are arrested to take the responsibility for their wrong investment decision. The economic is shaking with this scandal. The central banks in each country in the world have to restructure the telecommunication companies in their countries.

In conclusion, this condition is looked like ‘an empty highway’ because there is an integrated Wi-Fi network but the media devices is still fragmented.

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