April/May 2003

Swisscom, the Swiss telecommunications giant, has embarked on a programme to develop an international network of wireless "hotspots" for providing local Internet access. It has acquired UK-based Megabeam, a rival to BT Openzone, and German-based WLAN, the market leader in its own country. They are to be combined in a service called Swisscom Eurospot.

Swisscom Mobile, the division running the new service, has already rolled out over 100 hotspots of its own, and another 240 are in development. Megabeam has a presence at 100 hotels and 14 major airports across Europe. Altogether Swisscom Eurospot launches with about 800 hotspots in eight countries (and it has partners in four others).

Competition is also coming from the mobile phone market (T-Mobile is rolling out a UK hotspot network), while other independent challengers in Britain include Broadscape and UK Explorer. But commentators fear that lack of interoperability between the various networks could eventually stifle development.

 

• Swisscom Eurospot is to adopt public-access gateway hardware and embedded software from Nomadix to support its Europe-wide expansion.