SR Telecom Eyes Local Market for WiMax

Canadian broadband fixed wireless solutions provider SR Telecom believes Mexico will be one of the top 10 countries in the world for WiMax sales in 2006, SR Telecom's marketing vice president Chad Pralle told BNamericas.

Mexico's transport and communications secretary SCT is due to publish a draft bill very soon for opening up the 3,400-3,700MHz band for WiMax, meaning operators can install networks without the need for a concession license.

According to Pralle, Mexico is in a category of developing countries with reasonable PC penetration and GDP per capita but still with low DSL broadband penetration, and such countries may leapfrog wired broadband, going straight to wireless.

"There's a lot of talk about WiMax and what it can do. People talk about putting it into New York City and providing mobile broadband access. But in the short term it is countries like Mexico that are going to be the driver for WiMax volume because there's pretty good PC penetration, good GDP per capita and a real drive to get broadband," Pralle said.

At the beginning of this month, SR Telecom announced it had won a US$10mn contract to deploy equipment for Mexican fixed line operator Axtel, which Pralle says was the most significant WiMax contract won anywhere in the world in 2005.

Pralle expects a shift this year with carriers starting to offer WiMax broadband solutions to residential customers rather than just corporate and small office home office (SOHO) clients.

MOBILITY

SR Telecom's WiMax solution is point to multipoint with the capacity for 1,000 to 6,000 subscribers on a single base station. The equipment has the potential to offer each subscriber up to four voice lines and a broadband connection of over 2Mbps, Pralle said.

Pralle sees WiMax becoming an alternative technology for carrying mobile data in the short term and replacing mobile technologies that currently offer 3G data transfer speeds.

"WiMax provides a much better broadband experience than any of the 3G solutions available or likely to be available," Pralle said.

"There are certain types of applications that people use that are never going to work over the 3G model. VoIP over the data side of 3G is not great. The peak rates don't support high bandwidth applications like good video. WiMax is really more equivalent to 4G," Pralle said.

SR Telecom's technology is suitable for mobility, however, mobile devices with good battery life have still not been fully developed yet, Pralle said. These are typical teething problems with rollouts and are likely to be resolved over time, he said.

BNamericas.com "

Posted to the site on 14th March 2006