Wednesday, December 12, 2012

FreedomPop Takes On Home Broadband

Los Angeles-based free, broadband access firm FreedomPop--which is backed by the founders of Skype--said today that it is expanding into the home broadband market. The company said it will begin accepting preorders for a home modem which will provide free, high speed Internet in homes and small offices. FreedomPop said its new Hub Burst home modems are scheduled to ship next month, and will allow users to access up to 1GB of free data a month. The firm will also offer up premium bandwidth starting at $10 per month. FreedomPop is leveraging the legacy 4G WiMax network of Clearwire for its service. The company is led by Stephen Stokols. FreedomPop said that premium users will be able to get their bandwidth at 80 percent chapear than today's DSL or cable, at speeds faster than typical DSL and on par with most cable providers. The company's venture backers are Mangrove Capital, DCM and Atomico.

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