Get2net while gettin’s good

Confessions don’t come easy to Julie Jacobs.

Get2net’s vice president of public access services projects the kind of steely confidence that comes from being one of the matriarchs of interactive travel. She helped start TheTrip.com and then founded CyberFlyer Technologies, which was acquired this summer by Get2net.

Openly expressing doubt didn’t get her this far, and, frankly, it’s not good for business. Not on the eve of a major expansion and a new marketing campaign.

But flanked by Get2net’s content producer, Pam Shelpuk, in a Denver cafe on a recent Saturday afternoon, Jacobs admitted that the race to wire every airport in the country with a high-speed Internet connection won’t be as easy as anyone thinks.

“We’re skeptical to some degree,” she says. “The business model is not proven. We don’t know if we will make money.”

It may be a while before Get2net does know. That’s because if you find one of its terminals today, chances are you’d be able to log on for free. The average unit gets about six hours of use every day from a total of 25 travelers, according to the company’s internal research.

In other words, these machines, which offer a T-1 connection at no charge, are being used only one-quarter of the time. (After publication, Get2net insisted such a description is misleading, since most airports are closed at night.)

But it’s a safe bet that if anyone is going to turn a profit in the nascent market for on-the-go Internet connectivity, Get2net will. Since buying CyberFlyer, the company has embarked on one of the most ambitious expansions since the advent of the CRS. It plans to install 1,500 terminals by the end of next year and a staggering 6,000 units by 2003.

Get2net is backed by a European parent company that is “very patient,” says Jacobs. What’s more, its Continental affiliate, 3C Communications, already has deployed more than 2,000 stand-alone terminals overseas.

So Get2net not only has the capital, it also has the experience to make ubiquitous wiring happen. “We’re also hoping that the need for information will extend beyond the business traveler to leisure travelers. It’s not there now. But it will be,” Jacobs says.

Jacobs’ optimism might have seemed misguided if she’d said that a few months ago. Today, however, it doesn’t sound so strange that vacationers might need the ‘Net the same way they might require a pay phone.

“We had two of the most amazing days that really gave us hope,” says Shelpuk. “One was Black Monday, when the stock market crashed. And the other was when the Starr Report came out on the Internet. Those were big days for us. It wasn’t just the corporate travelers using us. Everyone was.”

Get2net’s so-called NetStations, which look like minimalist PCs, rest on a table top and cost between $8,000 and $10,000 each. Revenue-sharing arrangements vary from location to location. The company recently inked deals with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey to install NetStations at Newark, LaGuardia and JFK airports, as well as with Host Marriott.

Look for the units to show up in bars, restaurants, lounges, and highway rest stops starting this month.

Get2net also is enlisting its partners to get the word out about the terminals. If you see a NetStation (think flat screen TV with a silver frame) you might also spot a Host Marriott employee next to it with some promotional literature. Shelpuk and Jacobs seem frustrated that the NetStations are so inauspicious, travelers often don’t know they’re there.

Should all of their efforts yield the dividends they expect,
there’s still no guarantee that Get2net will retain its virtual monopoly on Internet connectivity at airports and other public places. Jacobs knows that in a business where everything can change overnight, another technology might come along and leapfrog over theirs.

Then again, who’s to say Get2net won’t develop the Next Big Thing?

Such is the promise — and peril — of interactive travel.

Christopher Elliott is the author of Scammed: How to Save Your Money and Find Better Service in a World of Schemes, Swindles, and Shady Deals. Critics have called it “eye-opening” and “inspiring” — it’ll “grab your attention and won’t let go.” Order your copy now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble or iTunes.

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