Partnership boosts iPass to over 50M Wi-Fi hotspots, making it the heavyweight champion of global Wi-Fi connectivity
REDWOOD SHORES, Calif., Aug 4, 2015: iPass Inc (NASDAQ: IPAS), the world’s largest commercial Wi-Fi network, today announced a strategic partnership with Devicescape, making iPass the world’s largest Wi-Fi network. Under the terms of the alliance, iPass will integrate the Devicescape Curated Virtual Network (CVN) into its global Wi-Fi network, allowing iPass customers access to Devicescape’s amenity Wi-Fi network of over 20M hotspots worldwide.
“With the launch of the iPass Unlimited Wi-Fi service in April, we opened up the opportunity to be everywhere,” said iPass CEO Gary Griffiths. “On our first quarter 2015 earnings call in May, I promised to double our global Wi-Fi footprint by the end of this year. With today’s partnership with Devicescape, and other network partnerships signed that I will disclose on the second quarter earnings call this week, we in fact will have more than doubled our presence by the end of this quarter. Coupled with our developing product features offering invisible connectivity, our alliance with Devicescape is significant not only in moving iPass customers closer to ubiquitous connectivity, but also in setting the stage for global Wi-Fi accessibility for the Internet of Things.”
Complementing and expanding the iPass network, Devicescape is available in the places where people want to be connected: hotels, airports, cafes, retail outlets and many more venues where people congregate and travel. Devicescape’s curation process uses crowd-sourcing to discover the best available amenity Wi-Fi locations. Using cloud-based machine learning, Devicescape combines more than 20 million locations into a single network, quality controlled in real-time. The Curated Virtual Network is a proven carrier-grade solution, having been deployed by mobile operators, MVNOs and Wi-Fi First providers in the U.S. and Europe.
“Today’s end users just want connectivity — and a network of 50 million hotspots offers connectivity on a truly extraordinary scale,” said Dave Fraser, CEO Devicescape. “We are thrilled to be contributing our Curated Virtual Network to an undertaking of such ambition. We look forward to working with iPass to take this network well past what is already a very significant milestone.”
“We’re proud to soon be able to offer our customers access to over 50 million hotspots around the globe,” Gary Griffiths continued. “With a global population of over 7 billion data-hungry people, and estimates of over 28 billion smart devices in use by 2020, seamless global connectivity delivered via a standard format and user experience will be fundamental. In the last five months, the combination of iPass Unlimited, Everywhere and Invisible has put us well in the lead in this global race, and we’re only getting started.”
For the period of this agreement, iPass will have limited exclusivity to Devicescape’s assets. The partnership is effective immediately, with integration expected to be complete by the end of the current quarter.
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About iPass Inc.
iPass delivers global, mobile connectivity as a hosted cloud service, connecting its customers with the people and information that matter the most on all of the devices they choose to carry: smartphones, tablets and laptops. iPass (NASDAQ: IPAS) is the world’s largest commercial Wi-Fi network, with 20 million hotspots in airports, hotels, airplanes and public areas in more than 120 countries across the globe. In the rapidly changing technology of Internet connectivity, iPass is the industry pioneer in ensuring businesses have unlimited access to unlimited content.
iPass® is a registered trademark of iPass Inc. Wi-Fi® is a registered trademark of the Wi-Fi Alliance. All other trademarks are owned by their respective owners.
About Devicescape
Devicescape operates the world’s largest Wi-Fi service platform, delivering Access, Insight, and Engagement Services for operators, mobile application providers, and device manufacturers. Powered by a global Curated Virtual Network of tens of millions of amenity Wi-Fi locations, including those provided by some of the world’s most popular service and retail brands, Devicescape enables a Connectivity First customer experience at an unmatched operating cost.
Media Contacts:
US
Caitlin Haskins — 10Fold
Tel: 415-800-5369
Email: ipass@10fold.com
UK
Kewal Varia — Spark Communications
Tel: 020-7436-0420
Email: ipass@sparkcomms.co.uk