When wireless worlds collide

By NV

LIKE many others, the first thing your correspondent does when within hailing distance of a public hotspot is switch off his mobile phone’s 3G/4G data network and join the internet courtesy of freely available Wi-Fi instead. He can then download dollops of data without the anxiety of breaching his wireless carrier’s monthly megabyte cap and running up punitive charges. He is not alone. According to comScore, a market research company, more than 42% of mobile-phone traffic, and over 90% of tablet traffic, travels by Wi-Fi instead of the carriers' own cellular networks.

Once, the future of wireless depended exclusively on the mobile-phone companies’ ability to secure enough spectrum in order to beef up their cellular networks. Now, Wi-Fi is emerging as the leading means for delivering ubiquitous connectivity. The widespread adoption of smartphones and tablets is driving this “Wi-Fi first” change of direction. In the United States, 90% of tablet owners bought their devices without a wireless data contract—so confident were they in never needing to access the internet via a mobile carrier’s pricey cellular network.