LTE and WiMax

LTE is very strongly supported by the incumbent 3G operators - both GSM/HSPA and CDMA/EV. In addition it had adopted many of the technology benefits that Wimax pioneered, both on the radio side (better wireless performance) and on the actual network side (simpler, more IP-based network). I think that both technologies are open and that Wimax will converge to LTE anyway, so you will have a GSM/LTE, CDMA/LTE and Wimax/LTE type scenario. This single standard will bring down the price of networks and handsets considerably and speed up innovation because of less research duplication.

I see there is also quite a lot of information available on Advanced LTE (the next step after LTE), but not much on Wimax going that far into the future.
 
The article by Frost and Sullivan about WiMAx and LTE confuses technology openness with business model openness. WiMAX is not inherently more or less open than HSPA or LTE, it is the choice of operators (and others) as to how "open" they will be in terms of their networks and the terminals, applications, and services to which their customers have access. For example, Android handsets are already becoming available on some established mobile networks such as T-Mobile in the U.S. From my perspective - admittedly a distant U.S.-based one - there is a considerable amount of muddled thinking about WiMAX in South Africa (unfortunately encouraged by some U.S.-based companies) that I hope will be clarified in the near future so that the country can take advantage of the best available and most appropriate wireless technologies for the benefit of its customers and economy. I have been struck for example by the oxymoron apparent in discussions about the 2.6GHz band which characterize it as being both "WiMAX" spectrum, and planned for so-called "technology neutral" licenses.
 
mroetter said:
From my perspective - admittedly a distant U.S.-based one -
Click to expand...
and a valuable one thank you - the WiMAX spectrum references are really just the media trying to get a fix on what's going on together with the hype surrounding it about two years ago when a number of test licences were issued

ICASA actually called out the vendors in the findings document on these bands - remarking that they espoused tech neutrality but somehow still seemed to manage to promote an outcome suitable to their own interests
 
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