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Kevin Kahn is senior fellow & director, Communications Technology Labs, Intel, responsible for technologies such as radio, optical, and copper physical layer technologies, CMOS, etc. some of his primary current focus areas are broadband access to the home, wireless LANs and PANs, spectrum policy, and related Internet issues. Additionally, he helps drive communications strategies and policy for Intel.
How does one go about connecting the masses?
The issue is how do we give access of the great resource of Internet to more than a billion people. We should seriously think about how to reach out to the masses and create opportunity for the much larger percentage of the world population, and give the advantage the top million people are getting today.
No service provider has shown much interest in going deep into the rural areas?
That is a real challenge. It is the worst problem in India. But the problem is still present even in the US. There are several areas in the US where service providers don't want to penetrate. But, eventually as a society, we have to figure out how to do it, and create technologies to do it cost effectively. The simplest way to connect the masses is to make the cost structure more reasonable.
How are you working with the government of India?
We are suggesting to the government to look for globally harmonized spectrum and plan accordingly rather than going for India specific spectrum. If globally harmonized spectrum is located in India, operators will definitely get advantage of the scale, so that the cost will automatically come down irrespective of Intel intervention.
Also, in terms of devices, we are not looking just at the Indian market but also emerging world markets. We work with them to bring the cost of devices down. When we are talking of low cost devices, we are not talking of running all the applications on it, but an effective cost device. The device will address particular community requirement.
Why do you think broadband has not taken off in India?
I think there is a natural cycle to these things and you may see the cycle in India soon.
Are you doing some research on people and technology in your lab?
Over the last six years, our sociologists and anthropologists are studying how people use technology in their lives. They are also studying interaction of religion and technology.
What kind of form factor are you looking for WiMax device?
You will certainly see a laptop, which is the first target. Nokia is said to be developing a enabled phone. WiMax is just an enabler of technology.
Today, we have laptops, cellphones, and PDA kind of devices. Interestingly, several people carry all of them. They use them according to their convenience. You would want those devices to talk to one another and do what the user wants. Today, they all only talk to the networks. In the future we should see some devices that communicate seamlessly. For example, I want a cellphone with no screen, and I want it only as an earpiece. It would be great if the earpiece has some rudimentary voice recognition, so that when I place a call I will be perfectly happy not to have screen at all.
Sudesh Prasad
sudeshp@cybermedia.co.in
Source: Voice&Data
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