Open Garden launches at TechCrunch DISRUPT NYC 2012 — Wins Most Innovative Startup Award
Travelling and looking for Internet access? A new smartphone app allows users to share mobile Web access for free with other people nearby who have the same app.
Called Open Garden, the app forms a mesh network that enables each person connected to it to relay it to other users.
"Every smartphone is a computer and a router, so we thought it was the right time to interconnect all of these devices together to make general access more ubiquitous," said Micha Benoliel, co-founder and CEO of the San Francisco-based company Open Garden.
"As long as the devices are in proximity they recognize themselves seamlessly. If one device in the mesh has access to the Internet, then the other device can benefit from it," Benoliel added.
If a smartphone user with Open Garden is in a cafe or hotel and does not have access to Wi-Fi, but someone else does, the user can piggyback on the other person's connection.
Benoliel said the functionality could be especially useful for travelers eager to avoid hefty roaming charges.
"You can be traveling and arrive at an airport and instead of paying expensive roaming charges, you can just connect to someone in the airport who has Open Garden," he said.
When there is no direct Internet connection in the network, the app accesses the Web through links to other devices such as laptops or mobile phones. If the person whose connection is being shared leaves the network, the app automatically connects to the next best connection.
The app is available for Android devices, Windows and Mac. It works as a mesh network only if it has been installed by other people nearby to form the peer-to-peer connections.
Benoliel said the app can also be used to interconnect different devices, such as an iPhone and tablets, for free using the plan.
The company is working on features to help users limit who shares their Internet and data connections and how much data they want to allocate to the app.
In future versions, the company said users will be able to connect to social networks to specify desired network sharers.
Despite criticism from mobile carriers concerned about losing revenue, Benoliel said the app could benefit them by helping to decongest crowded 3G and 4G networks by offloading them to WiFi, where there is more capacity.
Open Garden Mobile Mesh formation
It began with WiFi and Bluetooth Tethering: one mobile device wirelessly sharing its data connection with others. Now, we are blooming into a Mobile Mesh Network of many interconnected devices pooling their bandwidth for mutual benefit.
Such a mobile mesh network, in its highly adaptive and self-optimizing capacities is evolving wireless networking into a rich, vibrant garden of information. An Open Garden.
Our users are not just power consumers, but students sharing knowledge with classmates, workers routing vital access to fellow employees, and if the need arises, sources of a potential lifeline to information.
In global regions with underdeveloped infrastructure or restrictions on information, mobile mesh tethering may be the primary and often only source of internet access to individuals whose need for its empowerment is greatest.
Simply put, Open Garden provides a valuable service for those with existing internet access and an invaluable necessity for those without.
Such a paradigm shift in the network topology is expected to be met with hesitation. Contractual concerns have been raised about mobile tethering, but it can only utilize the bandwidth which subscribers pay for and are allotted. Nothing is taken from the network operators. Still there is concern that users will get better deals on their unlimited data plans and increase network operation costs.
And, here too mobile meshing is the answer: by utilizing the WiFi and Bluetooth capacities of mobile and laptop devices to integrate various wireless and hard access points, a mobile mesh network can route data opportunistically through the right assets at the right time. Thus Open Garden can in fact reduce network congestion and generate fresh value every time it leverages the resources of multiple networks to offload traffic from an overburdened access route to an underutilized one.
Network performance is optimized for subscribers and providers alike. Subscribers will simply experience better coverage and more bandwidth, and will be increasingly satisfied with their service provider of choice. Providers in turn will see network congestion reduced and new opportunities for revenue. Mobile mesh networks cannot replace service providers, they can only make them better.
Open Garden is an idea whose time has come. It is a natural evolution of wireless networking from an unwieldy and disarrayed mass into an adaptive and self-organizing ecology. That which is efficient, grows, and the Mobile Mesh Network is forming…
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