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Karam and Shubhendu, congratulations. I knew about wifi-dabba a couple weeks ago from a stray comment on HN, and some co-workers and I were universally impressed. I head the tech-committee for a local housing-welfare association in Bangalore, with a well maintained central park which sees a lot of foot traffic. If you guys are interested we could pilot your dabba at the park (the tokens can be sold at the attached HO…
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?
50$ android phones have taken by storm, and now they are free to use a 2rs token to connect and download the songs themselves.
All the best.
Good going. : ] Any plans for expansion to other cities or is it a trial run at Bangalore? Also, since you are an ISP, how do you keep costs down on network equipment & fibre laying.
Cool idea, I think you can also install it in cabs and public transport. People spend more time in traveling in Bengaluru. All the best.
Can you talk a little bit about how you power the Dabbas and refresh the tokens if they are only valid for 24 days. Do you guys function like "doodh wallahs" in that you visit the locations every morning to reset power and tokens? Would seem like a hassle but convenient from the point of view of the chai wallahs.
The dabbas are plugged into the wall for power, practically all tea shops tend to have a power line of some sort even if its not obvious at first glance. We provide a battery backup too. Our software handles refreshing of tokens, so no need to visit the store that often for maintainence.
Edit: Addendum: Also, if they are physical, why did you consider physical over simply displaying them on a tiny screen? I can think of one reason, I can buy a token and activate it later at home.
Danm.. I remember going to Chai-wallahs and reactivating my dongle. Cost me a lot of money for very little bandwidth usage.
1. What is the setup cost? 2. What are your expansion plans, specially in remote areas of India? Will the model still be profitable?