Quantum-Wireless.com recently interviewed Wilson Electronic’s Marketing Manager Jonathan Bacon. He discussed Wilson’s latest offering, the Wilson Sleek along with the future of Wilson, along with his take on the F.C.C.’s position on cell signal boosters with the mobile carriers.
1.Can your please introduce yourself, your company and your position?
Wilson Electronics, Inc., a leader in the wireless communications industry for more than 40 years, designs and manufactures a wide variety of cell phone signal boosters, antennas and related components that significantly improve cellular communications. It has designed solutions for poor cellular reception in mobile, building and machine-to-machine (M2M) applications. All Wilson products are engineered, assembled and tested in the company’s U.S.-based headquarters. Wilson amplifiers fully comply with FCC regulations for cellular devices and are FCC and Industry Canada type accepted. Wilson Electronics has developed and patented microprocessor-controlled signal booster (or amplifier) technology, which protects cell towers from interference.
As the Marketing Manager at Wilson Electronics I oversee projects relating to driving SEO results for our products to ensuring that our packaging has the same look and feel. It also involves media outreach, product promotions, managing our social media outreach and projects and working with the sales team to ensure their needs, and those of their clients are being met.
2. How is the new Sleek different than other products on the market of its kind?
With the Sleek, Wilson Electronics engineers were able to combine all of the elements that make our products successful and effective, without sacrificing the key components that make it a Wilson product, all for a very affordable price. The Sleek is an all-in-one cradle cell phone signal booster. It works by having the phone placed into the cradle, placing the included magnet-mount antenna on the roof of the vehicle (or mounted on a metal bracket by a window for use indoors), and then plugging it in. It’s that easy! The cradle is also designed to support a Mifi card or even a GPS device (if it uses cellular signal) as it works to amplify both cellular and data signals.
3. What is the minimum separable distance between the cradle and the external antenna? Maximum distance?
It is recommended that the external antenna is about 12 inches away from any other antenna, and a few inches away from any windows or a sunroof. There really isn’t a maximum since you’ll only have about as much distance as the cord will allow, which is 12 feet. The key is to have the antenna mounted up high allowing it clear access to the radio waves it is trying to capture, and making sure it’s mounted on metal such as the roof of a car or a metal bracket.
4. What type of antenna can be connected to the new Sleek?
Included with every Sleek is one of our mini-mag’s, or a small, 4-inch magnet mount antenna. If you are interested, you can purchase several different, optional antenna’s as well. Those include:
* 12″ Magnet Mount Antenna: High Gain Magnet-Mount Antenna
* Trucker Antenna: Ideal for mirror mounting on a large truck. Mounts on a 3/8″ mirror mount
* NMO Mount Antenna: For permanent vehicle roof mount. For professional mounting on cars or pickup trucks
* RV Antenna: For vehicle roof mount on an RV
5. Who would be the ideal customer for the new Wilson Sleek?
Great question! Simply, it’s ideal for anyone tired of dropping calls, especially iPhone users. Anyone who has experienced dropped calls while driving
* In a city,
* rural area
* or in general, areas of weak signal coverage
is the ideal user for the Sleek. An optional home accessory kit can be purchased as well, which will allow you to use the Sleek indoors. Please note that the Sleek is a single-user device, so it will only boost the signal of the phone in the cradle. It also works best with a bluetooth or headset device. Using it with a bluetooth device is ideal as it will give you additional range, while allowing you to enjoy the best possible cell phone signal.
6. We have read recently that the Wilson Sleek is designed to work internationally, what is Wilson’s marketing strategy for the international marketplace? And what regions are most appealing to Wilson?
The Sleek is designed to work with all major North American cell phone providers except for Nextel/iDen. It will be sold throughout Canada, Mexico and even parts of Central and South America.
Internationally, Canada is a great market because both Telus and Bell Canada (two prominent carriers in Canada) sell and endorse Wilson Electronics products. That said, the largest market is clearly the U.S., with rural areas (central part of the country, but rural areas don’t really have a specific region) having the largest need. That said, urban areas or heavily populated cities have a great need as well due to the buildings that can block signals, or cell towers being overloaded by the amount of people trying to make a call through each one. All of these factors make nailing down the most appealing region very difficult.
7. Would the Sleek 815226 support 3G networks on the iPhone 3GS if it uses the 2100 MHz frequency band?
No. Wilson Electronics does have some models available right now (811914) which will work with the 2100 MHz as well as 900 MHz. This will also work with the iPhone and comes with a cradle as well.
8. What other new products can we expect coming from Wilson down the pipe?
It’s important to note that for competitive reasons we’re not wanting to disclose everything we have in the pipe right now. That said, stay tuned as some very cool items are coming in soon–that will open us up to other bands and data speeds.
9. What is Wilson’s market position in the cell booster market?
Currently, it is our understanding that Wilson Electronics dominates the cell phone signal booster market. This is due to
* Our products having a reputation of being the most carrier friendly thanks to patented technologies and in-house engineering that is second to none
* A vast line of products that will work in a car, boat, RV, home, office, building, and even many M2M (machine-to-machine) products that help with asset tracking or data transfer
* Industry leading product guarantees and warranties
* U.S.-based tech support–now with extended hours of support, and
* The best credibility in the industry for building quality products that work as advertised
10. Who are some of your potential competitors, what edge does Wilson have over them?
Needless to say, there are several companies that exist in the cell phone signal boosting space, but none have been in the telecommunications business for more than 40 years, like Wilson Electronics has. Also, no one has close to the 10 years of specialized and focused experience in the signal boosting world like we do. It may sound like I’m boasting, but in reality we are proud of these facts, as both have lead to our credibility in the space and our drive to constantly improve our products and product lines. Additionally, we stand by these statements:
* Receive Signal Farther from the Site: Our signal boosters detect signals farther than anyone thanks to greater receiver sensitivity and lower noise figure
* It’s About the Patented Technology: Our patented oscillation protection eliminates interference that inferior products can create
* It’s About Protecting the Cell Towers: Our cell tower overload protection allows our signal boosters to figuratively turn the volume up when its far from the cell tower, and speak softer when its close
* All Engineering is Done In-House: Our engineers are part of the process from product development, to product testing before our award winning signal boosters ship off the production line
* Customer Satisfaction is Our Top Priority: Our products all come with a full one-year warranty and 30 day money back guarantee
* Signal boosters are proudly made in the USA
11. What’s on Wilson’s road map for 2010-2011?
We’d like to put the FCC issue behind us and either,
* Come to an agreement with cell phone carriers about what regulations should be implemented by the FCC in order to deem signal boosters as transparent tools to be used by the general public without concern of interrupting the network, or
* Work with the FCC to implement new regulations and/or standards for approving cell phone signal boosters so that poorly created boosters can be eliminated from the market
We’d also like to help more users see that dropped calls don’t have to happen just cause they have an iPhone or any phone for that matter. We’re confident the Sleek will help us break down the barrier to entry for many people who are hoping to eliminate dropped calls or poor signal strength. We’re confident the next two years will be break out years for the signal boosters especially as more people learn about the affordable and effective solutions offered to them, like those offered by Wilson Electronics.
12. What impact do you see the F.C.C. ruling having on Wilson Electronics and its competitors?
First, to clarify, there hasn’t been a ruling on signal boosters in regards to ours, and others, recent petitions. As we understand it, the FCC is currently reviewing the comments, and comments on the comments (Approx. 80% of which–by our count–were in favor of keeping signal boosters on the market from suppliers like Wilson Electronics, and in support of our petition to tighten regulations for signal boosters).
Based on the overwhelming support from the comments filed to the FCC, and the need for a signal boosters in rural areas, or even to help safety officials who depend on our products (more than 600 government or safety agencies currently use our products nationwide), we are hopeful the FCC will make a ruling in our favor. If this happened, it would either weed out the bad signal booster manufacturers since the regulations would be too strict, or at the very least, it would create a need for signal boosters manufacturers to start producing boosters at a higher standard. To reiterate, we proposed the following rule changes for approving signal boosters:
* Oscillation (feedback) detection and auto-shut down – To prevent interference with cell towers
* Proximity detection and auto shut down – To prevent signal overload of cell towers
* Bi-directional signal amplification – A weak link in cellular networks is the phone’s low power to the tower. Some signal boosters today amplify only the incoming signal to the phone. While the phone shows more bars, these boosters do nothing to increase the phone’s weak signal transmission back to the tower, where amplification is needed most.
