AT&T reports 10.5 million Wi-Fi connections so far this year

23.04.2009
says users connected to its hot spots 10.5 million times in the first quarter of 2009, more than triple the number of times its users connected to Wi-Fi hot spots in Q1 2008.

AT&T attributes the large increase in demand to two factors: the proliferation of Wi-Fi capable devices and the expansion of the company's Wi-Fi footprint. On the device side of things, AT&T has expanded its roster of popular Wi-Fi enabled smartphones, such as the iPhone 3G and the BlackBerry Bold, which accounted for more than 4 million connections to the company's hot spots. The company is also offering complimentary access to any of its Wi-Fi hot spots to any user who signs up for qualifying broadband or 3G wireless plans, meaning that the number of AT&T customers with access to Wi-Fi has grown significantly.

In terms of Wi-Fi hot spots, the company aggressively expanded its Wi-Fi footprint last year when it began deploying its Wi-Fi services to 7,000 Starbucks locations nationwide. AT&T also broadened the scope of its Wi-Fi business last year by , a network and applications management company that provides back-office management for Wi-Fi hot spots. In total, the Wayport acquisition and the Starbucks deal helped the company branched out its Wi-Fi footprint to roughly 20,000 locations in the United States and more than 80,000 locations around the world.

AT&T could see even more users connect to its hot spots if Apple adds the low-power 802.11n Wi-Fi standard to its devices. In addition to saving battery power when connecting to the Web, the 802.11n standard would also increase devices' performance over Wi-Fi networks, as it supports dual bands and provides download speeds in the 30Mbps to 50Mbps range.