- Helium’s new CEO says Wi-Fi isn’t old-school offload anymore – it’s a smarter, carrier-grade control layer
- As Starlink generates satellite buzz, Helium is betting the real mobile traffic battle is still happening indoors
- With FWA straining carrier capacity, Helium sees a bigger role for managed Wi-Fi and QoS
Everyone seems fascinated by what’s going on with satellites in the sky. But Helium Network is firmly planted on the ground and considers it the perfect place to be right now.
Helium’s consumer-facing brand, Helium Mobile, helped the company prove its decentralized network was carrier-grade. Now that the MVNO is in the hands of Andrew Yang’s Noble Mobile, the Helium team can focus on the network.
That’s exactly what Mario Di Dio, Helium’s new CEO, has been doing the past several years, building it to work at “carrier scale” with major carriers in the U.S. (AT&T and T-Mobile) and Mexico (Telefónica), with international expansion underway in Brazil and the U.K.
Helium is not your conventional wireless network. It’s built on a decentralized wireless (DeWi) model that incentivizes individuals and businesses to buy and install Wi-Fi hotspots that are shared with the network. Hosts get rewarded with Helium Network Token (HNT) cryptocurrency based on usage. The network has more than 140,000 mobile hotspots deployed worldwide.
Not that it’s all rosy. Helium’s HNT crypto token is down 64% for the month and 87% for the year. The value of HNT fell 15% the day former CEO Amir Haleen said he was leaving that position, though he remains chairman.
Of course, Di Dio sees a lot of reasons to be optimistic about Helium’s future, including its ability to provide Wi-Fi offload to major wireless carriers.
But that word “offload” can be a bit outdated, Di Dio told Fierce.
Let’s dig into that.
Wi-Fi offload then and now
Recall (or don’t, it was a long time ago) when AT&T had the exclusive on the first iPhone, it turned to Wi-Fi to help out when its network got saddled with more traffic demands than it could handle. The industry called that “Wi-Fi offload.”
In the old days, it wasn’t always a great experience to be on Wi-Fi because the operator didn’t control the user experience.
But Helium came up with a way to change that. Helium’s quality of service (QoS) platform allows carriers to dynamically monitor and manage Wi-Fi offload sessions. Metrics are sent to the operator in quasi-real time, giving them the control to decide if the user is better off on Wi-Fi or on cellular.
“That's why I say it's not just a simple offload as it used to be,” he said.
Future of Wi-Fi QoS
There’s a lot of chatter about 3GPP potentially doing Wi-Fi management QoS in the future, he said.
“What I think is our secret sauce is the fact that we have the ability to do that on today’s Wi-Fi,” he said. “It’s a value proposition enhancer.”
That said, Helium is very active in the Wi-Fi industry and is working within industry bodies like the Wireless Broadband Association (WBA) to encourage OEMs and ODMs to include QoS metrics in their stacks.
“Our goal is to help make the entire Wi-Fi industry adopt this quality of service first mentality when it comes to Wi-Fi offload,” he said.
Wi-Fi’s indoor advantage
Everyone is looking at Starlink Mobile and what they’re doing in the direct-to-device (D2D) space. “There’s no doubt they will be a big player in the industry. They already are,” he said. “We actually welcome the idea of having someone else entering the market.”
But Starlink faces an indoor coverage challenge – something Helium addresses very well with Wi-Fi, by the way. Some 80% of mobile traffic still happens indoors, he noted.
“I think that Wi-Fi Passpoint and the way Helium does it, specifically with this way of doing it in a smart and intelligent way, is the answer for that,” he said.
He sees fixed wireless access (FWA) as another catalyst for Wi-Fi. As wireless carriers’ FWA traffic pushes their capacity limits, they’re going to look for more ways to serve their customers and Wi-Fi is perfectly placed for that, Di Dio said.
“The demand for Wi-Fi offload is only going to increase,” he said. “Helium’s position is even better than anyone else because of the way we’re approaching Wi-Fi offload.”
Some people may argue that private LTE/5G will displace Wi-Fi, but Di Dio said it’s not a winner-take-all market. There are use cases where private 5G makes sense and others where Wi-Fi or distributed antenna systems (DAS) prevail.
“The reality of it is Wi-Fi is here to stay. The standard is evolving year after year in a way that makes it more reliable in terms of user experience,” he said.
The future will converge with multiple networks, where the network is intelligent enough to pick and choose the best connection – whether that’s cellular, Wi-Fi or satellite. “I don't believe that one will win it all,” he concluded.