WiMAX to remain niche technology in India

WiMax to remain niche technology in India

As mobile frequencies will not be available in the short term, Gartner does not expect mobile WiMAX rollouts to be available at larger scales before 2009, at the earliest

Idhries Ahmad

Friday, May 30, 2008

Excerpts from the interview with Gartner's Nareshchandra Singh.

CIOL: How do see the role of government in pushing service providers to roll out the WiMax service in the country?

Nareshchandra Singh: In November 2007, the Department of Telecom (DoT) decided that it would auction the 3G and WiMAX Spectrum. For 3G, the Indian government allocated 30 MHz of bandwidth in the 2100 MHz band. Therefore, there will be three or six licenses released dependent on the government's decision on whether 5 MHz or 10 MHz will be given to each license holder. The government also decided to auction three WiMAX licenses in the 2.5 GHz band with 10 MHz each.

The timeline and bandwidth of 3G and WiMAX licenses will heavily impact the future mobile broadband access market share in between 3G and WiMAX. The permission for mobility in the WiMAX license will also influence the future of WiMAX growth. Also, 3G seems to have, in comparison to WiMAX, a better ecosystem in place.

CIOL: What do you see as the evolution path for WIMAX?. In terms of cost, how is WIMAX placed when compared with other technologies?

NS: Products based on fixed version of WiMAX have been certified by the WiMAX forum in 2006. Most of the current deployments are based on these. Recently, mobile WiMAX products for usage in the 2.3 GHz band (specific to Korea) have got certification from the forum.

However, certification process for products based on the 2.5 GHz band (favored by most countries, including India) are ongoing and yet to complete. Only on certification of various product sets by different vendors, mobile WiMAX will start putting in place a viable ecosystem to address large opportunities, unlike the present niche implementations.

CIOL: How do you see it competing with other technologies like 3G HSPA? Are WCDMA/HSPA and WiMAX not competing, but rather complementing technologies?

NS: WCDMA/HSPA and WiMAX are competing technologies, as both promises to be the dominant platform for providing truly outdoor wireless broadband access. They will complement indoor WiFi hotspot access. WCDMA and HSPA are already commercially deployed by several operators in several countries around the world, while WiMAX deployments are still in trial stage and few commercial offerings are available worldwide.

CIOL: Why should operators invest in a new technologies like WIMAX when there is already 2G infrastructure of operators ready to roll out their 3G services

NS: For established cellular operators, there will be little or no incentive to go in for a different wireless broadband platform than the one that is the logical progression of existing standards – namely 3G wireless. Backward support is going to be a key requirement, which 3G platforms already support. On the inter-operability front, WiMAX will have a lot to achieve before current wireless operators can take a shot at it.

The biggest obstacle in the way of rural infrastructure expansion from the service provider's perspective is less RoI and high Capex and Opex. In India the ARPU for a rural user is considerably low when compared to an urban user. In this light what are opportunities for service providers to expand their portfolio in rural India What is the business sense for operators to roll out services in Rural India. Any alternative revenue model you see service providers contemplating

Current economics just do not support a substantive rollout of wireless broadband in rural India. Alternatives like the OLPC and vernacular content needs to be fully explored to create and sustain demand.

©CIOL Bureau

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