October 01 2008
If the recent news from Nortel Networks Ltd. (NYSE/Toronto: NT - message board) that it’s seeking to “de-risk” its investment in 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology underscores just one thing, it’s that the market for wireless infrastructure is ultra-competitive and over-supplied. (See Nortel 4G Plans Up in the Air.) The surprise is that this needs saying at all. Back in May 2004, when the sector was on the upswing, I wrote a report highlighting the unsustainable cost structures of radio base station suppliers, given the overall size of the market and unrelenting pricing pressure. (See the Unstrung Insider report “Open Base Stations: Cutting the Cost of 3G Networks.”)
Any time a new technology launches, there are bound to be a few questions - and manufacturers/providers/etc aren’t always exactly thorough about making things clear. Case in point: Sprint’s confusing home vs mobile XOHM coverage.
In his keynote talk this morning at the 4G Executive Summit (WiMAX World ) AT&T’s Hank Kafka claimed that, “For the U.S. wireless market to meet the soaring demands of consumers, we have got to set targets, but targets without a plan are only wishful thinking. In general, most of our operators have similar 4G targets but the difference will be in the path to those targets.”The nature of that path was the main topic of discussion at this executive summit. AT&T’s Kafka extolled the virtues of GSM and its long-term evolution (LTE).”Our evolution has been from GPRS to EDGE to UMTS to HSPA and soon LTE,” Kafka said. “It’s clear that LTE will fit neatly… This is the great advantage of the GSM evolution: We are not starting from scratch. GSM can build from the existing technologies. It takes years for new technologies to get broad coverage nationwide.”
This new higher data rate further enhances OBSAI’s support for emerging 4G architectures and services and also allows both existing and future RF modules to be ‘daisy-chained’, thereby saving cabling costs in distributed base-station deployments The new data-rate capability of OBSAI has been achieved by incorporating aspects of the Serial RapidIO (SRIO) standard within the OBSAI RP3 specification, thereby leveraging the considerable industry support already in place for the SRIO standard
Elektrobit Corp. on Tuesday (Sept. 30) rolled out what it claims is the industry’s first radio channel emulator aimed at manufacturers of basestations and subscriber devices using WiMax, LTE and other 4G wireless network standards.
September 30 2008
As RF designers work rapidly to create products that support the new long term evolution (LTE) cellular wireless standard, understanding the new test requirements for LTE assumes ever greater importance as this technology becomes more widespread. For the wireless industry, these changes are nearly as significant as the move from analog to digital, requiring new measurements and new test equipment. This article looks at what LTE is and the main challenges to testing for engineers.
A next-generation 4G wireless network based on mobile WiMAX technology debuted today in Baltimore, heralding the start of a new era for wireless consumers as Sprint officially launched XOHM(TM) mobile broadband commercial service in the first major U.S. city. “This is truly an historic day with the birth of a completely new Internet-based business model that alters the dynamics of the traditional telecom industry,” explained Barry West, president of Sprint’s XOHM business unit. “Wireless consumers will experience WiMAX device and XOHM service innovation on multiple levels as the computer, Internet, telecom and consumer electronics industries converge to redefine wireless mobility.”
CE Vendors Offering Internet Connectivity Must Get the Usage Model Right
The trend towards cramming ever more functions into mobile phones is forcing consumer electronics vendors to explore new capabilities in their devices in order to stay relevant to consumers in a “connected age.” Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) combining specialized functions (camera, media player, navigation etc.) with wireless Internet access seem likely to succeed and consumers increasingly expect their electronics to connect to the Internet. But makers of these products have only a window in which to build devices and business models that users will adopt.
Sprint promised the commercial launch of its Wimax network by the end of September. Today it kept that promise. The nation’s No. 3 wireless company launched its high-speed WiMax service in Baltimore today. “This is truly an historic day with the birth of a completely new Internet-based business model that alters the dynamics of the traditional telecom industry,” Barry West, president of Sprint’s XOHM business unit, stated in a release. “Wireless consumers will experience WiMAX device and XOHM service innovation on multiple levels as the computer, Internet, telecom and consumer electronics industries converge to redefine wireless mobility.”
The term “4G” is used in varying manners to describe upcoming mobile network deployments. Often, the term “4G” is simply used to refer to new access standards such as LTE and WiMAX that employ technologies such as OFDMA and MIMO (generally not present in today’s mobile networks), offering performance improvements over current mobile peak data rates. The ITU’s IMT-Advanced standard defines 4G wireless as providing over 100 Mbps of capacity to high mobility users — a user-centric, rather than technology-centric, definition. It is anticipated that networks based on LTE or WiMAX standards will deliver over 100 Mbps of capacity to users (even if not in their initial deployments), so there are natural overlaps in the uses of the term “4G” depending on whether one is talking about “standards”, “technology” or “capacity”.
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A collection of information, news and opinion on 4G, an acronym for Fourth-Generation Communications System, is a term used to describe the next step in wireless communications.
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| Steve Jones, an independent
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Visit his other site: Mobile Social Networking (mobsocnet) Contact him regarding assignments & site advertising via steve AT the3gportal.com |
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