StarNet, the parent company of MegaPOP is doing something this week that not that many startups have done this year – planning on a potential IPO in the spring of 2002.
The Palatine, Ill.-based Internet services wholesaler says it will squelch longstanding rumors that it is ripe for acquisition on Tuesday by announcing its entry into trading shares on the public market exchanges.
The news couldn’t come at a better time. StarNet CEO and former Motorola executive and engineer, Russ Intravartolo is expected to overlap the IPO announcement with a keynote address into deploying fixed wireless broadband solutions at this week’s 802.11 Planet Fall 2001 Conference & Expo in Santa Clara, California.
The event, sponsored by INT Media Group (NASDAQ:INTM), the parent company of internet.com and this site, brings together some of the best cutting edge strategies
802.11 is a wireless standard sometimes known as Wi-Fi. The show is attracting exhibitors and attendees from leading wireless companies and has also received official endorsement from the Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance (WECA).
Established in 1995, StarNet introduced StarNetWX fixed wireless services in June this year.
Using the latest spread spectrum technology the company, currently provides wire-free broadband access to residential and business users in the greater Chicago-land area and growing by the day.
Inside The Numbers
The thought that StarNet even is thinking of an IPO is exciting to executives who nearly bailed on the whole high-speed Internet business last December after it backed out of DSL contracts with Covad Communications.
Overall, StarNet has some 1,000 ISPs signed up for its wholesale service. The company offers basic dial-up, filtered access, packet filter, CallFinder, co-location, domain registration and proxy RADIUS services.
The technology caught the attention of Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT), which ended up inking a deal to add some 1,200 points of presence (POP) for its MSN service.
Since then, the company as made an amazing turnaround – averaging close to 500,000 transactions per month through its partnership with Internet Billing (iBill).
