Wireless coming into play, slowly, with Comcast Business

Comcast Business can chase the very small-medium business customer with choice, price and service but it can't match the wireless component a Verizon or AT&T or even Sprint can bring to a telecommunications package. For now.

Parent company Comcast is a joint venture partner with Clearwire and has been deploying its fourth generation Clear WiMAX wireless to residential customers. Business customers have sniffed out the Clear package and some have received dual-mode laptop cards that handle WiMAX and 3G mobile from another Clearwire partner, Sprint, but those offers have been limited and the offers certainly aren't ubiquitous among the Comcast Business customer base.

"We have some billing limitations as to how many cards per account we can service, at least in my market," explained Dave Brown, vice president of business services for Comcast Business' Oregon/Southwest Washington region. "I think it's a great business (but) it's not core to our business model yet."

Giri Kowalke, owner/president of IT specialist company EVOLV, in Eugene, Ore., and a Comcast Business customer said he is aware of the Comcast wireless offering even though it's not "heavily advertised" but isn't impressed with what's being done with WiMAX--at least from the data side.

"The biggest disadvantage about Clearwire, besides the speed, reliability and connection ... is that they put a limit on how much data you can do in a month," Kowalke said. "The don't advertise about that because nobody ever hits it (limit)."

Almost nobody.

"I had a client that had Clearwire because that's all they had available who hit the data limit three different times in the month they had Clearwire. Once you hit the data limit, they cut you off for that month," he said.

Brown didn't address that issue specifically, but did note that things might be looking up for business customers who want a wireless edge.

"The card works very well. It's an up-and-coming great platform," he said.

Related articles:
Whispers getting louder: Comcast ready to target big business customers
AT&T deepens Internet connectivity relationship with Hilton Worldwide
Consumers take swipes at Comcast cable service; lawyers line up against TWC