By Claus Hetting, Wi-Fi NOW CEO & Chairman
Mesh Wi-Fi solution provider eero is betting on communities and MDUs as one of their next growth markets. The company says its focus on simplicity of management and customer experience excellence fits perfectly into the emerging Wi-Fi for MDUs market, where many building owners and property managers still shy away from the perceived complexity and cost of offering reliable Wi-Fi for tenants. The solution ‘eero for Communities’ was announced in August this year.
The allure of a nearly pristine market for managed Wi-Fi for MDUs – typically apartments and condominiums – is strong, and mesh Wi-Fi pioneer eero may be one of the Wi-Fi solution providers with the most to offer right now. The company’s ‘eero for Communities’ solution – announced in August of this year – includes a long list of convenient features that should keep property managers, building owners, and not least residents smiling.
“The idea is to allow tenants to enjoy all the well-known eero features for customising their Wi-Fi easily and immediately as they move into their new home – and then add functionality that makes delivering and supporting Wi-Fi services super easy for building managers. We know that most building managers are not technology or network experts, so simplicity is not optional, it is required. Costs can also end up spiralling out of control if Wi-Fi solutions and their management are not seamless or specifically optimised for multi-family properties,” says Ashwath Krishnan, Product leader at eero.
The new solution for example allows eero routers to remain in the apartment or condo unit when moving out so that the system can be used immediately by the next resident. Eero calls this Service Left in Place, or SLIP. “It may sound unnecessary but in the past a new tenant has often also been associated with a truck roll, technician visit, or CPE equipment shipment and recovery. Such costs and overheads can now be eliminated – and that’s a huge benefit to building owners and new tenants,” Ashwath Krishnan said.
An eero-powered property-wide Wi-Fi network also means that properties can offer residents the experience of living in a smart building. The solution includes a dedicated IoT network to control things like door locks and thermostats, even cameras and various kinds of sensors, eero says.
“These types of services are becoming increasingly important for residents particularly because they of course want to stay secure in the homes. Meanwhile property managers rely on wireless IoT to attract new residents, save on operational costs, and ensure proactive maintenance including operational convenience like over-the-air software updates,” says Ashwath Krishnan.
MDU-specific hardware & the right user experience
Perhaps eero’s strongest value proposition is simplicity of use for both the tenant and building managers and not least speed of installation. Add to this the fact that the company has developed MDU-specific hardware solutions with the eero hardware portfolio now including wall-mount units powered over Ethernet (PoE). Last but not least coordinated Wi-Fi frequency planning for the property as a whole reduces interference and boosts Wi-Fi quality, eero says.
“We feel we have a winning proposition also because we know we’ve designed this with building managers, residents, and even broadband service providers in mind. The initial ideas for the feature set for eero for Communities was developed in partnership with a major operator client,” says Shahrukh Raheem, Head of Product B2B at eero. Broadband provider Frontier Communications is one of the early adopters of eero for Communities according to this eero blog.
According to market research by Parks Associates there are some 700,000 multi-family properties in the US and only 1-2% of these enjoy property-managed Wi-Fi today. The segment includes apartments, condos, town homes, duplexes, and dormitories. This means the market for managed MDU Wi-Fi is enormous and still in its infancy, said Elizabeth Parks at WWC Toronto in September – read more here.
/Claus.
