BWA (Broadband Wireless Access) winners recently received wireless spectrum, our meetings indicate they are no in a hurry to rollout the services given the eco-system constraints and slower pace of equipment procurement. Based on our discussions with industry participants we believe almost all BWA operators will initially rollout Wimax. Some of them intend to move on to LTE (Long-term evolution) in 2-3 years of time, once the eco-system for LTE develops. We do not consider BWA as a near-term threat to 3G given its relatively weaker eco-system and launch in an unpaired band (as a result of which operators may not enjoy scale economy benefits).
WiMax Vs LTE Device eco-system
- Wimax dongles are available at US$ 30; customer premise equipment for US$ 40
- LTE eco-system will take atleast 2 yrs to develop
- First set of LTE devices would be costly (~US$ 100) and not affordable to mass-market
- Wimax equipment can be used for LTE – 20 MHz of TDD spectrum could be split and 10 MHz could be used for Wimax and 10 MHz for LTE
Global Vendors for WiMax
Huawei
ZTE
Motorola
Samsung
Global Vendors for LTE
Huwaei
Ericsson
Nokia
Alcatel Lucent
