Canieti Sees WiMax As Key to Broadband Uptake
Mexico's electronics, telecommunications and IT association Canieti sees the entry of WiMax services as a key factor in improving the country's broadband penetration rate and is now the primary focus of the industry organization.
WiMax is cheaper to deploy than DSL infrastructure and so should result in more widespread broadband at higher connection speeds, Canieti's regional director for the southern and central regions Roberto Martínez told BNamericas.
"Mobile broadband technology, such as WiMax, is a much less costly option for the installation of telecoms infrastructure than a wired installation... [as much as] eight times less," Martínez said.
According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Mexico had a broadband penetration rate of 3.5% at the end of 2006.
Telecoms regulator Cofetel's commissioner José Luis Peralta told BNamericas last week that the watchdog plans to start the auction process for concession licenses in the 3.4-3.7GHz band for wireless broadband services in as little as two weeks.
Martínez said he is confident that Cofetel will comply with its promises to have concessions in the hands of operators this year.
However, several important matters still must be resolved such as how Cofetel decides to distribute the concession licenses; nationally, regionally or both, Martínez said.
For example, when the Colombian telecoms ministry initially held auctions for WiMax it assigned three national licenses as well as licenses for individual departments. The benefit of that is that it allowed smaller companies, interested in only one department, to compete for a license.
However, Martínez cautioned that whatever the case may be, the regulator must insure that the winners of the licenses must deploy networks quickly and not hold onto the asset for future rollouts.
The latter is also something seen in Colombia, where only one of the three WiMax concession holders, Orbitel, has actually deployed any sort of services."
Posted to the site on 25th May 2007
