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Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

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Re: Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

#31

Post by blhack »

mildlyclassic wrote: post #30
blhack wrote: post #29

Seriously 20 rupees for 20GB?!? For context, that is about $0.30. In any case, this is awesome. Any plans to expand to other cities soon? An unrelated question (that I think you might have a good answer to): When I've been to India, I've noticed that there is a lot of free WiFi around (in Mumbai, at least), but ALL of it requires that you have an Indian phone number that you have to register in order to get access. W…

The phone number requirement is a government thing, it's not really from the provider's perspective. The good news is that the government is rethinking this and TRAI has recently recommended stopping it. Our backhaul is 100mbps fibre lines.

Really cool. Are you guys running custom hardware in the yellow boxes or is it something off the shelf?

Re: Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

#32

Post by mkagenius »

mildlyclassic wrote: post #28
msound wrote: post #17

Congratulations Karam and Shubhendu! Two questions: 1. Does this mean you are an ISP? If so, how did you go about registering as an ISP. 2. Most other WiFi (ex: at Cafe Coffee Day) requires one to register via SMS and pay by credit card. So the mobile number and Credit Card number becomes the primary key for our Government's Big Brother program to track the person. Have you side-stepped that by selling tokens that on…

1. We are an ISP, we've applied for the license from the Department of Telecom 2. The Telecom Regulatory of Authority of India has just recommended stopping the use of OTP. We really like that.

> The Telecom Regulatory of Authority of India has just recommended stopping the use of OTP

Was there any article regarding this?

Re: Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

#34

Post by mildlyclassic »

blhack wrote: post #31
mildlyclassic wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The phone number requirement is a government thing, it's not really from the provider's perspective. The good news is that the government is rethinking this and TRAI has recently recommended stopping it. Our backhaul is 100mbps fibre lines.

Really cool. Are you guys running custom hardware in the yellow boxes or is it something off the shelf?

Custom. We've also got some nice processing power & storage in our Dabbas for future plans.

Re: Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

#35

Post by mildlyclassic »

mkagenius wrote: post #32
mildlyclassic wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. We are an ISP, we've applied for the license from the Department of Telecom 2. The Telecom Regulatory of Authority of India has just recommended stopping the use of OTP. We really like that.

> The Telecom Regulatory of Authority of India has just recommended stopping the use of OTP Was there any article regarding this?

I've linked to the paper below, the money quote is "Authentication through OTP should be done away with"

http://trai.gov.in/sites/default/files/Press_Release_18_0903...

Re: Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

#37

Post by quadrature »

X86BSD wrote: post #14
mildlyclassic wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's super fast because we draw a 100mbps line to each store. We install our own routers. It's totally free for the store owner, we charge nothing up front. We split revenue with the store owner 80-20.

Where are you getting fast Ethernet pipes to stores there?? Having been there I find it hard to believe that infrastructure is there.

I think the infrastructure in bangalore would allow for this.

Re: Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

#38

Post by blhack »

mildlyclassic wrote: post #34
blhack wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really cool. Are you guys running custom hardware in the yellow boxes or is it something off the shelf?

Custom. We've also got some nice processing power & storage in our Dabbas for future plans.

Can you share any details of what the hardware is?

Re: Launch HN: Wifi Dabba (YC W17) – Low-Cost Wifi in India

#40

Post by mildlyclassic »

woah wrote: post #39

Lots of these kind of "coffee shop wifi" things have not really been very successful in the US. Is India just a fundamentally different market, or do you guys have a different approach?

Our unit economics are good. The average unit breaks even in a couple of months. This is a lot like AirBnB, there's a market here that nobody is paying attention to. All the big companies are talking about it, but very few are doing it.
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