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May 21, 2007

Clearwire Completes First Test Phase

By Glenn Fleishman

The company is migrating from proprietary gear to mobile WiMax over time: Their 15 sq. mi. test in Oregon in Intel country—one of the big backers of mobile WiMax—was apparently successful. The next phase grows to 145 sq. mi. The test covered coverage, capacity, and speed, the firm said. They say they’re on track to deliver mobile WiMax in 2008.

The current Clearwire technology has a bottom line performance about half the speed expected from the entry-level mobile WiMax offering, and uses technology manufactured by Motorola through a former division of Clearwire sold to that electronics giant.

The significance of mobile WiMax is not just faster speeds or greater distances. Rather, the promise is that with major equipment makers such as Intel, Samsung, and Motorola committed to producing gear in quantity, and with two providers rolling out in this country and others in South Korea, that the cost of getting the network running and customers equipped will be low enough to compete with 3G cellular data networks and their continual upgrades.

That remains to be seen, as the news anchors like to say.

Still, a publicly held firm declaring success on trials sets a legal bar for them if they later were to have trouble that was predicted at this stage.

Posted by Glennf at May 21, 2007 5:03 PM

Categories: 2.5 GHz, Mobile WiMax, Trials

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