Exploring the WISP Industry - Swiss Case Study

Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN) are receiving considerable attention in the industry and are perceived as a possible disruptive technology, capable of posing a credible threat to the dominance of mobile network operators and their 3G networks. In spite of this, the business aspects of public WLANs have been neglected by the research community. The objective of this paper is thus to investigate the use of WLAN to offer wireless services from a business point of view. The study is based on the example of current supply of WLAN services in Switzerland. By investigating different kinds of WLAN service providers and analyzing their business models through mini case studies, the paper provides a deeper insight into business aspects of public WLANs.