COVERAGE
GOAL
Expand physical coverage.
ACTOR
Individual hotspot hosts.
ECONOMIC DRIVER
Token rewards for coverage.
SUCCESS TEST
Did the footprint grow?
Interactive investor article · updated July 20, 2026 · U.S. market only
HIP-149's dilution:
what should it buy?
Roughly 141M HNT over 36 months only works as distribution capital if it buys access to controlled, non-home Wi-Fi that carriers will pay to use. Scattered low-traffic deployments do not clear the economic test.
Capital141M HNTapproved runway
Benchmark$0.10/GBnot a guaranteed realized price
Scarce assetControlnot venue count
Underwriting verdictPortfolios or failurethe unit is a controlled network
THE INVESTMENT RESET
Two events narrowed the bet.
HIP-149 marks the move from paying primarily for coverage to underwriting carrier-paid usage. The Noble transaction shifts the retail mobile business away from HNT holders. Together, they leave one cleaner question.
DISTRIBUTION
GOAL
Secure controlled Wi-Fi where non-home traffic recurs.
ACTOR
Managed portfolio operators.
ECONOMIC DRIVER
Carrier-paid Wi-Fi offload.
SUCCESS TEST
Can paid traffic justify ≈141M HNT of dilution?
THE OPERATING TEST LEFT BEHIND
After HIP-149 rewrote deployer rewards and the announced Noble transaction shifted the retail business to Noble, HNT holders are financing one narrower operating test.
Can Helium use the 141M HNT runway to sign companies that already control commercial Wi-Fi—and turn their networks into traffic that carriers pay for?
Controlled Wi-Fi means the partner can configure the network and has permission to operate it across locations such as hotels, campuses, hospitals, apartments, or retail sites.
Carrier-paid offload means an eligible subscriber's phone joins automatically, the traffic is authenticated and measured, and the carrier accepts those gigabytes as billable.
If that process works, paid traffic creates Data Credit demand and HNT burn. This report tests the U.S. economics; international expansion is upside only after the domestic mechanism works.
Sources: Helium HIP-149 and “The Next Era of the Helium Network”, June 4, 2026. Graphic and interpretation: Deep Waters Research.
01 · FROM WI-FI TO PAID USAGE
The hard part is not finding Wi-Fi.
It is turning ordinary Wi-Fi capacity into traffic someone will pay Helium to authenticate, meter, bill, and pay out.
Paid usage is narrower than Wi-Fi usage.
It is carrier or MVNO subscriber traffic that joins an approved Wi-Fi network, passes authentication and quality rules, gets measured, and is accepted by the payer as billable offload. A crowded venue proves demand for connectivity; it does not prove that any of the traffic will be paid.
The money path is simple. A carrier or MVNO pays to move eligible subscriber traffic from cellular onto trusted Wi-Fi. Helium authenticates the device, meters the traffic, and settles rewards or partner payments. One Data Credit equals $0.00001, so the public $0.10/GB benchmark equals 10,000 DC/GB. DC pay for transfer; HNT is burned when those DC are created. That burn is the token value-capture path.
INTERACTIVE EXHIBIT 01
Switch between protocol value capture and the operator's share of the same paid GB.
Follow one accepted GB from carrier payment to token demand.
Carrier or MVNO
Pays only for eligible subscriber traffic accepted under its offload contract.
Gate: traffic acceptancePaid GB
One authenticated, metered, and accepted gigabyte; ordinary venue Wi-Fi use does not count.
Gate: verified usage10,000 Data Credits
At the public $0.10 benchmark, one paid GB consumes 10,000 DC and requires HNT to be burned when those DC are created.
Gate: burn attributionToken demand
Carrier-attributable burn is the investor outcome. Traffic without accepted payment does not reach this step.
Gate: incrementalityModeled paid traffic20 GB/day7,300 paid GB/year
×Public price benchmark$0.10/GBnot a realized-contract forecast
=Gross carrier spend$730/yearbefore any commercial split
→Illustrative 50% operator share$30/month$365/year before site costs
Investor read: the technical path is necessary but not sufficient. Helium needs accepted carrier traffic to create attributable burn, while the operator needs enough residual cash to keep the supply online.
Sources: Helium Data Credit documentation, HIP-143, and HIP-149. Calculations: Deep Waters Research. The $0.10/GB rate is Helium's public benchmark; the 50% operator share is illustrative, not a disclosed contract split or a statement of the HIP-149 reward formula.
The small-site math leaves little room for labor.
The $0.10/GB figure is a benchmark, not a guaranteed price in every contract. At that benchmark, a site carrying 20 GB/day creates 7,300 paid GB/year, or about $730 of annual payer-side demand. That is roughly $61/month before Helium, the operator, the venue, support, hardware, internet capacity, or overhead divides the money.
With an illustrative 50% operator share, the site leaves about $30/month before site costs. A sales call, technician visit, support escalation, or venue negotiation can consume months of that value. The model starts to work when activation becomes configuration across many already controlled sites, or when one location produces hundreds of GB to multiple TB per day.
02 · THE CONTROL MAP
The market is controlled Wi-Fi—not venues.
Every paid GB must pass four contractual and operating gates. A venue logo proves little unless the full chain is contracted and operating.
A location is valuable only when somebody can open and operate its network.
Helium does not monetize a location because people walk through it. It monetizes a managed location when carrier subscribers join trusted Wi-Fi automatically, the traffic is authenticated and measured, and the payer accepts it under an offload contract.
The control point is often not the venue itself. Single Digits may run Wi-Fi across hotels or apartment buildings; Comcast/Xfinity Mobile may control millions of broadband gateways, although most are residential; a campus IT department may control a dense daily population; and an airport's useful contract may belong to Boingo or another wireless-rights incumbent.
Helium's addressable market is the revenue unlocked when carrier demand, controlled Wi-Fi, and venue permission can be contracted into the same billable transaction.
INTERACTIVE EXHIBIT 02
Select an actor to see what it contributes, what it needs, and how it can stop the transaction.
Carrier demand→Helium metering→Operator network→Venue permission
PARTICIPANTWHAT IT CONTROLSMUST RECEIVECAN STOP THE DEAL BY
Wi-Fi operators
Installed networks, day-to-day operations, venue relationships, and portfolio activation.
- Contributes
- Installed networks, operations, venue relationships, and portfolio control.
- Dependency
- Incremental revenue with little new labor or support exposure.
- Veto
- Existing carrier deals, hardware changes, or inadequate payout.
Source: Deep Waters Research analytical framework, using Helium's WiFi Conversion Security FAQ for Passpoint authentication and RadSec accounting, and its network-conversion documentation for integration of operator-controlled Wi-Fi. The control map is our interpretation, not an observed dataset.
MECHANISM EXHIBIT 02A · THE BILLABLE-OFFLOAD LOCK
Four gates must close on the same traffic. A company may control one or two; no partial combination gets paid.
A paid GB exists only after every gate closes.
The payer, network, venue contract, and usage record must all refer to the same session.
Carrier / MVNO
Defines eligible subscribers, accepts the traffic, and agrees to pay.
No payer → ordinary Wi-Fi use, not offload revenue.Wi-Fi operator
Can configure, authenticate, monitor, and support the network.
No control → no dependable carrier-grade service.Owner / rights holder
Permits offload and commercial use at the location.
No authority → the location cannot be activated contractually.Helium layer
Meters accepted GB, reports them, bills the payer, and routes payouts.
No proof → the carrier will not settle the bill.ALL FOUR CLOSED1 PAID
GB
GB
Same location. Same session. Accepted under contract.
Authenticated · metered · paidThe company map is secondary.A cable MVNO may hold the payer and Wi-Fi gates; a managed operator may hold the network and venue gates. Helium creates value only where it can close what is missing without breaking the same $0.10/GB bargain.
Source: Deep Waters Research transaction framework, using Helium's network-conversion documentation for authentication and accounting, and its Data Credit documentation for payment mechanics. Payer acceptance, venue authority, and the four-gate synthesis are our interpretation, not a reported Helium dataset.
Helium's proposed advantage is aggregation, not cheaper Wi-Fi.
A manager reusing an installed, well-used network may already serve incremental traffic below the $0.10/GB benchmark. What it may lack is enough geographic reach or contract volume to justify its own carrier integration. Helium's role is to pool many such portfolios behind one system for authentication, metering, billing, and payouts.
The operator contributes controlled Wi-Fi and day-to-day operations; Helium contributes aggregated carrier demand. The bargain works only if the same ten cents can pay both layers.
MECHANISM EXHIBIT 02B · THE AGGREGATION BARGAIN
Compare fragmented bilateral integrations with one pooled carrier interface, then inspect the economic room inside the $0.10 benchmark.
THE DEPLOYMENT ARITHMETIC
Aggregation has to happen twice.
First, one operator relationship must open many controlled sites. Then Helium must pool many operator portfolios behind one carrier-facing product.
site-level relationships
Permission, configuration, support ownership, and commercial terms repeat location by location.
operator relationship
One agreement can authorize and configure as many as 1,000 already controlled sites.
carrier interface
Many operator portfolios appear to the carrier as one authentication, metering, billing, and support surface.
What changes:portfolio acquisition turns 1,000 venue conversations into one operator decision; Helium then turns many such operator decisions into one carrier integration.
Every portfolio must become its own carrier product.
Each network may be cheap enough to carry traffic and still be too narrow to justify a direct carrier relationship.
Many controlled portfolios become one carrier interface.
→ Controlled supply + usage proof← Carrier payment + operator payout
The carrier gets breadth without integrating every operator. The operator gets demand its local footprint may not efficiently reach alone.
THE TEN-CENT CLEARING TEST
Aggregation creates access. It does not create more than ten cents.
In the existing controlled Wi-Fi base case, one site carries 20 paid GB/day. The direct-seller model assigns roughly 4.5 cents of cost to each paid GB, leaving about 5.5 cents before required return or any partnership split.
$010.0¢ gross carrier payment
4.5¢modeled direct-seller cost
5.5¢undisclosed headroom
Operator return+Helium aggregation+Incremental venue take
Cooperation clears only if the combined claims fit inside the headroom. If the operator's own economics require the full ten cents, adding Helium makes the deal worse—not better.
Model boundaryThe 4.5¢ cost is a scenario output for an independent direct seller at 20 paid GB/day. Actual Helium partner payouts and contract splits are not disclosed; the exhibit shows the constraint, not a forecast of the split.
Source: Deep Waters Research analytical framework and direct-seller cost model. The 1,000-sites-to-one-operator example and single carrier interface are illustrative operating units, not reported Helium deployments or contracts.
One hundred independent devices do not make a managed network.
A designed venue network has planned placement, wired internet capacity behind the radios, coordinated settings, automatic login rules, monitoring, and one support owner. Without that coordination, phones crowd some access points while others sit idle; internet links saturate, sessions fail, and no one owns the fix.
This is why the brownfield route matters. One relationship with an operator that already controls many networks can add carrier demand, authentication, metering, billing, and partner payouts without rebuilding every site. Helium can still recruit individual sites where no portfolio operator exists, but then it inherits site acquisition, configuration, monitoring, support, troubleshooting, and contract compliance.
One relationship that activates 5,900 controlled sites is worth more than 5,900 venue conversations.
03 · THE COST SCREEN
Traffic can be abundant and still fail the cost test.
The route—not the venue category—determines which costs must be recovered before the operator earns a return.
The same $0.10 paid GB supports radically different supply routes.
The model asks whether an independent Wi-Fi operator can deliver carrier-grade offload and recover activation, integration, support, internet capacity, site acquisition, venue costs, and capital. Each route changes that cost stack.
Controlled Wi-Fi reuses installed equipment and venue relationships. A new small-business site adds sales, installation, onboarding, and support. A dense greenfield build adds network design, cabling, equipment, and enterprise operations. Premium venues add minimum guarantees, rights fees, legal work, carrier coordination, and revenue share.
INTERACTIVE EXHIBIT 03 · ROUTE UNDERWRITING
Which supply routes clear the economic hurdle—and by how much?
Each row asks whether the assumed paid traffic covers the cost of creating and running that route at a $0.10 gross carrier payment. The panel at right defines the terms and follows the dense managed-overlay row from traffic to operator return.
WHAT IS MEASUREDCarrier-accepted paid GB per active location per operating day
Only data from an eligible carrier or MVNO subscriber that attaches to the Wi-Fi, is authenticated and metered, and is accepted by the payer as billable offload counts.
- Price used
- $0.10 gross carrier payment per paid GB
- Profit test
- 0%: revenue exactly covers modeled cost
- Costs included
- Capital recovery, acquisition and integration, support, internet capacity, venue rights, and allocated carrier-facing platform overhead
- Whose economics
- An independent operator contracting directly with a carrier—not a forecast of its HIP-149 reward or negotiated Helium payout
WORKED EXAMPLE · DENSE MANAGED OVERLAY
Follow one venue from billable traffic to operator return.
This route upgrades and connects a venue's existing, professionally managed Wi-Fi to a carrier. The black diamond assumes that one active venue delivers 2,000 GB of carrier-accepted, billable Wi-Fi traffic on each operating day. The 2,000 GB figure is an underwriting input—not observed traffic and not a forecast.
At the model's $0.10 payment per paid GB, 2,000 GB produces $200 of gross carrier payment per operating day. Modeled costs absorb about $190, or $0.095 per paid GB, leaving about $10 of operating profit: a 5.2% margin.
The colored markers ask how much paid traffic the same venue would need at the same $0.10 price. The blue outlined circle marks 1,826 GB/day, where revenue only covers modeled cost; the 2,000 GB assumption clears that point by 174 GB. The light-blue tick marks the 2,740 GB/day required for a 20% margin, leaving the assumption 740 GB short. The coral tick marks the 3,653 GB/day required for a 30% margin. The final 0.73× means 2,000 GB covers 73% of the traffic needed for a 20% margin—it does not mean a 73% return.
Modeled base trafficZero profit20% margin30% margin
SUPPLY ROUTE
PAID TRAFFIC / ACTIVE LOCATION / DAY
1 GB10 GB100 GB1 TB10 TB100 TB
MODELED COST / PAID GB
BASE ÷ 20% HURDLE$0$0.10 price$0.25
Existing controlled Wi-FiBrownfield: compatible managed Wi-Fi is already installed.Base 20 GB/day · zero 7.091 GB/day · 20% 9.273 GB/day · 30% 10.959 GB/day
$0.045+54.9% margin
2.16×clears 20%
New small-business siteNew sale, installation, onboarding, and recurring support.Base 30 GB/day · zero 82.192 GB/day · 20% 115.068 GB/day · 30% 143.836 GB/day
$0.222-121.8% margin
0.26×74% short
Dense managed overlayUpgrade and integrate an existing professionally managed network.Base 2 TB/day · zero 1.826 TB/day · 20% 2.74 TB/day · 30% 3.653 TB/day
$0.095+5.2% margin
0.73×27% short
Dense greenfield buildNew design, cabling, equipment, integration, and support.Base 2 TB/day · zero 5.23 TB/day · 20% 8.219 TB/day · 30% 11.507 TB/day
$0.189-88.8% margin
0.24×76% short
Premium airport · MAG floorIncludes a modeled $500k annual minimum guarantee.Base 26.64 TB/day · zero 29.17 TB/day · 20% 44.384 TB/day · 30% 73.973 TB/day
$0.108-8.1% margin
0.60×40% short
Why no stadium row? Its modeled calendar has 30 event days, so the comparable unit is 354.9 TB per event at zero profit—not traffic per day. Source: Cable MVNO / Wi-Fi Offload Direct-Seller Cost Model; scenario outputs, not disclosed incumbent economics.
The chart is primarily a cost-structure comparison.
Existing controlled Wi-Fi is the only modeled route that clears the 30% hurdle at base traffic. The dense managed overlay covers cost but produces only a 5.2% margin. New SMB, dense greenfield, and the airport case fail the zero-profit test before an investor asks for a return.
The ordering matters more than the exact point estimates. Brownfield activation spreads fixed costs across infrastructure and relationships that already exist; one-by-one acquisition, new construction, and premium venue rights push required traffic sharply higher. Those weaker routes need some combination of more paid traffic, a higher realized carrier price, or a lower cost stack.
Source: Deep Waters Research, Cable MVNO / Wi-Fi Offload Direct-Seller Cost Model, using Helium's public $0.10/GB benchmark. All traffic funnels, site costs, contract burdens, and return thresholds are analyst scenarios; they are not disclosed Helium, carrier, venue, or incumbent-operator economics.
Nearly 2,500 restaurant locations averaged 3.7 paid GB/day.
Helium reported more than 274,000 GB in one month across locations associated with 34 national brands. Coffee shops averaged about 7.3 GB/day, while Chick-fil-A—the outlier—averaged 37.9 GB/day. At ten cents, those cases produce roughly $11, $22, and $114 per site per month of gross carrier spend.
OBSERVED PAID TRAFFIC VS MODELED COST FLOORS
Even the outlier is less than halfway to one-by-one SMB break-even.
Paid GB per location per day · linear scale
020406080100120 GB/day
Restaurant portfolio$11/month gross spend
3.7 GB/day
Coffee shops$22/month gross spend
7.3 GB/day
Chick-fil-A$114/month gross spend
37.9 GB/day
3.7 ÷ 7.1 = 52%The broad portfolio average does not cover the modeled brownfield cost.
7.3 ÷ 7.1 = 103%Coffee shops only just cross the brownfield zero-profit line.
37.9 ÷ 82.2 = 46%The best brand case still misses new-site break-even by 54%.
Sources: Helium, “Faster connectivity for Fast Food Restaurants”, July 17, 2026; Deep Waters Research calculations and direct-seller cost model. Helium reported the locations and monthly GB; daily averages, gross-spend equivalents, and break-even comparisons are analyst calculations.
The restaurant may still benefit when reliable connectivity protects mobile ordering, loyalty, and payments. That is venue ROI. It does not show that an operator can afford to acquire and support each restaurant separately.
Rights costs turn traffic into rent.
Airports and stadiums may already have a long-term wireless contractor controlling the Wi-Fi, carrier relationships, and venue agreement. The relevant question is usually whether Helium can partner with that incumbent—not whether the venue has enough foot traffic.
Every $100,000 of annual venue rent, minimum guarantee, or rights cost requires about 1 million additional paid GB per year at $0.10/GB before support, internet capacity, partner payout, or operator return. The traffic burden rises in direct proportion to the fixed payment.
PREMIUM AIRPORT · BASE-CASE ECONOMICS
26.64 TB/day produces $2,664. The modeled cost stack is $2,879.
Daily dollars · $0.10 per carrier-accepted GB · $500k annual minimum guarantee
Gross carrier payment$2.7k/day
26.64 TB/day
$215/day shortfall
Total modeled cost$2.9k/day
$356Annualized capital + acquisition
$479Site operations + internet capacity
$274Allocated platform overhead
$400Variable operations
$1.4k$500k annual minimum guarantee
Base operating margin-8.1%
Zero-profit traffic29.2 TB/day
20% margin traffic44.4 TB/day
The $500k guarantee absorbs 47.6% of modeled daily cost. Tier-1/2-airport passenger traffic gets the case close to zero profit; the rights floor is what keeps it below the line.
Sources: Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport 2024 passenger count; Boingo Wireless 2020 Form 10-K for the existence of long-term venue contracts, revenue share, and minimum guarantees; Deep Waters Research cost model. Eligibility, attachment, usage, cost, and the $500k guarantee are analyst assumptions, not a disclosed airport agreement.
04 · THE SCALE BRIDGE
Turn the revenue claim into deployment units.
The same revenue target can require hundreds of premium locations or hundreds of thousands of ordinary sites. Partner concentration determines whether either route is executable.
$100M of carrier spend requires 2.74 petabytes of paid traffic every day.
At the $0.10/GB benchmark, $100M per year equals 1 billion paid GB per year, or about 2.74 million GB per day. At the model's 20% margin hurdles, that is roughly 295,000 existing controlled sites, 23,800 new small sites, 1,000 dense managed overlays, or 62 premium airports.
Those are not interchangeable deployment plans. Small sites multiply acquisition and support work; dense venues concentrate enterprise procurement; airports add rights economics. Helium needs many locations, many portfolio partners, or both.
INTERACTIVE EXHIBIT 04
Change the revenue target and partner count to see the deployment burden move at the fixed $0.10 benchmark.
Required paid traffic at $0.10/GB2.74 PB/day1.0b GB/year
SUPPLY ROUTE
LOCATIONS REQUIRED · LOG SCALE
PER PARTNERGROSS SPEND / LOCATION101001k10k100k1M
Existing controlled Wi-Fi9.273 GB/day at the modeled 20% margin hurdle
295.5k
5.9klocations × 50
$338gross spend per year
New small-business site115.068 GB/day at the modeled 20% margin hurdle
23.8k
476locations × 50
$4.2kgross spend per year
Dense managed overlay2.74 TB/day at the modeled 20% margin hurdle
1k
20locations × 50
$100.0kgross spend per year
Premium airport44.384 TB/day at the modeled 20% margin hurdle
62
1locations × 50
$1.6Mgross spend per year
Default-case read: 50 partners would still need to average roughly 5,900 controlled sites, 476 new small sites, or 20 dense overlays each. The network can mix the routes; it cannot escape the need for portfolios.
Source: Deep Waters Research calculations from the Cable MVNO / Wi-Fi Offload Direct-Seller Cost Model, using Helium's public $0.10/GB benchmark. Formula: locations required = annual gross carrier-spend target ÷ (modeled 20% margin traffic per location × 365 × $0.10). The $100M target is an analytical scenario, not Helium guidance; the traffic hurdles are modeled rather than observed network averages.
Dense venues can prove the network. They cannot carry the scale thesis alone.
Our U.S. screen found roughly 1,000-2,250 core candidates across large campuses, major medical centers, malls and high-traffic retail centers, and transit hubs. Adding lower-confidence mixed-use and office districts raises the range to 1,500-3,750.
Overlays required1,000at 2.74 TB/day each
Share of core pool44-100%1,000-2,250 candidates
Share of expanded pool27-67%1,500-3,750 candidates
Source: Deep Waters Research U.S. dense-venue screen using the U.S. Department of Education College Scorecard, AHA hospital counts, AAMC teaching-hospital counts, public mall estimates, and the Bureau of Transportation Statistics National Transit Map. The ranges are analyst-screened candidates, not contracted or economically qualified Helium sites.
The comparison is generous. The count identifies places with plausible density and control; it does not prove that a site has enough eligible traffic, reusable Wi-Fi, or contract terms that leave a 20% operator margin.
Helium has to bring demand the operator cannot obtain as quickly on its own.
A managed Wi-Fi operator connects its portfolio only if Helium turns existing capacity into incremental carrier-paid revenue with limited new work, limited support exposure, and no damage to venue relationships. The pitch is carrier demand, proof of usage, billing, and partner payouts—not cheaper routers.
The bargain works only where Helium can pool enough portfolios to justify one carrier integration and still leave enough of the ten-cent gross payment for the operator, venue, support burden, and HNT value capture.
05 · WHAT TO WATCH
Report burn, named traffic, and unsubsidized retention.
Hotspot counts and venue logos are secondary. These are the three tests that should govern continued capital deployment.
Each HNT leaving the vault has to buy more carrier-paid use.
Divide carrier-attributable HNT burn during the period by HNT released from the HIP-149 vault. If the ratio rises, each HNT of dilution is buying more payer-funded network use; if it falls, the vault is spending faster than carrier demand is arriving.
Two commercial checks sit beneath that ratio. Named traffic asks whether paid GB comes from third-party operators that control real portfolios. Unsubsidized retention asks whether those operators renew and expand after vault-funded launch support expires.
All three are required. Burn without provenance can be subsidy-driven; named traffic without retention may disappear when incentives fall; retained supply without attributable burn may create an operating network while HNT captures little of the value.
INVESTOR DASHBOARD 05
The current status is a reporting gap: the formulas are knowable, but the required operating series are not yet disclosed together.
Raw operating data→Comparable metric→Capital-allocation decision
METRICCALCULATIONWHAT IT PROVESDATA STILL NEEDEDSTATUS
01
Carrier burn per HNT drawn
Carrier-attributable HNT burned ÷ HNT released from the HIP-149 vault
Whether each HNT of dilution is buying more payer-funded network use.
Monthly carrier-attributable HNT burn, vault releases, payer identity, and an attribution method.
Reporting gap
02
Named traffic
Carrier-paid GB from named third-party operators ÷ total carrier-paid GB
Whether Helium is opening commercial Wi-Fi portfolios it did not already control.
Paid GB/day by named operator, activated-site cohort, venue class, and reporting period.
Reporting gap
03
Unsubsidized retention
Locations active after 6 and 12 months ÷ launched locations, after launch support expires
Whether independent supply renews and expands once vault-funded launch support is removed.
Active sites, carrier-paid GB, total operator compensation, launch subsidies, renewal, and churn by cohort.
Reporting gap
Why all three are required: burn shows token demand, named traffic shows commercial distribution, and unsubsidized retention shows whether that distribution survives without launch money.
Sources: Deep Waters Research framework; the first metric adapts the capital-efficiency test in Nick Carpinito, Helium: No Longer Inert, Blockworks Research, June 2026; HIP-149 for the supplement-vault reporting obligation. Named traffic, unsubsidized retention, and the assessment of current reporting gaps are Deep Waters Research definitions based on public disclosures through July 20, 2026.
Ameriband, Talus, and Mambo fit the partner profile.
Ameriband connects enterprise Wi-Fi to carrier networks; Helium announced plans to integrate more than 100,000 Ameriband-linked access points. Talus builds city, campus, school, and private-wireless networks; its Redondo Beach conversion was reported to serve more than 2,000 users per day over existing city Wi-Fi. Mambo supplies guest-login, authentication, and network-management software to Brazilian businesses and ISPs; Helium cited a 40,000-access-point footprint.
Each relationship could open many controlled sites, but Helium has not disclosed carrier-paid GB/day by partner. The restaurant release makes the same distinction from the other direction: it identifies where traffic appeared, but not who opened or controls those networks.
Every layer has a credible way to absorb the surplus before HNT does.
Controlled Wi-Fi operators may already have direct carrier relationships. Activatable supply may be too residential or too low-traffic. Premium venues may capture the economics through rights, guarantees, and revenue share. Carrier pricing may fall below $0.10/GB or move into opaque flat-rate bundles. Tokenholders may fund growth while most software, service, and partner economics accrue off-token.
If the three reporting ratios do not improve, the problem is not presentation. It means HNT is funding activity that has not yet converted into HNT demand.
HIP-149 is a funded attempt to buy distribution into Wi-Fi networks Helium does not own.
If Helium brings carrier demand, authentication, metering, billing, and partner payouts that portfolio operators cannot obtain as quickly on their own, the partnership path is plausible.
If operators already monetize offload directly—or Helium recruits fragmented, low-traffic sites—the public $0.10/GB model becomes difficult to underwrite.
The decision turns on three reported series: carrier-attributable burn per HNT drawn, named traffic, and unsubsidized retention.