Mesh Telecom
How a South African ISP manages 150,000 monthly Wi-Fi users, monetizes public Wi-Fi through advertizing, and prepares to scale across 13 new sites with Powerlynx.
Who Is Mesh Telecom?
Mesh Telecom is a South African fibre network operator and ISP founded in 2008. The company operates nationally and manages one of the country’s largest public Wi-Fi networks, with a strong presence across retail malls, commercial locations and rural areas. Today, its public Wi-Fi network serves over 150,000 users per month. Mesh Telecom is already preparing another 13 sites, which could bring roughly 100,000 additional monthly users onto the network.
Mesh Telecom Public Wi-Fi and Connectivity Services
Equipment Used Across Their Public Wi-Fi Hotspot Network
MikroTik is the main hardware used across Mesh Telecom’s public Wi-Fi network. Huawei is also used for some hotspot deployments, while Cisco is used in higher-end environments.
How They Monetize Wi-Fi Across Retail Locations
What Was Required to Scale Wi-Fi Across Shopping Malls
Scale a high-volume public Wi-Fi network – support large numbers of concurrent and monthly users, and keep hotspot management simple as the network grows.
Add new locations easily – the team operates across different types of sites and needs to bring new hotspots online without rebuilding the setup every time.
Monetize mall Wi-Fi traffic – run brand advertizing, support paid access and collect customer data through the Wi-Fi login flow.
Keep branding flexible across locations – use different splash page branding for different malls and hotspot sites.
Integrate with vouchering platforms and other systems – keep integrations simple as more services are added around the Wi-Fi network.
What Changed for Mesh Telecom with Powerlynx
Mesh Telecom manages its hotspot locations centrally in Powerlynx. According to the technical team, adding new locations is straightforward, particularly with MikroTik deployments.
Mesh Telecom runs both video and static ads across its mall hotspots and manages the advertizing setup through Powerlynx. This is an important part of the company’s plans to generate more revenue from its public Wi-Fi network.
Mesh Telecom uses different branding for different hotspot locations. Mall hotspots, for example, are branded specifically for the individual mall.
The team highlighted the ease of connecting Powerlynx with vouchering platforms and other systems as one of the key benefits. This gives Mesh Telecom more flexibility as they develop paid access and other Wi-Fi services.
The scalability of the platform is impressive. The ease with which we can integrate with vouchering platforms and systems works well.
Why Powerlynx Works for Their Mall Wi-Fi
Easy to Manage
Hotspot setup and advertizing are easy to configure across different mall locations.
Ease to Scale
With around 150,000 monthly users across its mall Wi-Fi network, Mesh Telecom needed a platform that could handle that scale, stay easy to manage, and make new locations simple to add.
Flexible for New Requirements
Advertizing and reporting can be adapted as Mesh Telecom’s needs change.
Responsive Product Support
The team values the flexibility to discuss new requirements with Powerlynx, especially around advertizing and reporting.
Powerlynx Features That Fit Their Retail Wi-Fi Setup
Supporting hotspot management, advertizing and different Wi-Fi access models across the mall network.
Managing the network in Powerlynx is straightforward, even as it grows. We also value the flexibility to discuss new ideas and requirements around advertising and reporting with the Powerlynx team.