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January 14, 2005

Intel Teams with Chinese Vendor

By Nancy Gohring

A deal between Intel and Chinese vendor ZiMax seems to be one of the biggest headlines coming out of the Wireless Communications Association conference this week: ZiMax, a subsidiary of ZTE, will use Intel’s Rosedale chips to make fixed WiMax gear.

Apparently Intel and others at the conference were really focusing on the mobile version of WiMax gear to come. It seems that the first version of WiMax has been taking a beating recently, with a lot of analysts and others taking note of its shortcomings and market challenges. The mobile version is quite a ways into the future though, so market development during that time frame could affect its potential for success.

Intel also pushed the idea of whittling down the number of WiMax profiles to ensure interoperability once the mobile version hits the market. Some of the vendors have told me that the first wave of WiMax gear won’t interoperate, which means that an operator can’t buy base stations from several vendors but CPEs from one, in order to realize economies of scale. This defeats part of the purpose of having a standard. Interoperability is much more important with the mobile or portable versions, however, as users’ clients will have to operate on various base stations from different vendors as they move.

Posted by nancyg at January 14, 2005 10:32 AM

Categories: Chips

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