Officially, 802.16e - or Mobile WiMAX as the vendors insist on calling it, even though its greatest advantage is that it spans fixed and mobile operations - is almost with us.
The standard is frozen, many of the forum's profiles are close to completion, certification testing is supposed to start towards the end of the year, two plugfests have been held, and suppliers are showing off their pre-certified equipment. ... However, this is all eerily reminiscent of the early days of 802.16d fixed WiMAX equipment, when there was a phony war between various so-called WiMAX systems as the market waited for certification testing to begin and "real" WiMAX products to hit the streets.
Now there is the same situation and the same dilemmas for buyers - namely, should they buy a first generation 802.16e system, non-certified or, even at the turn of the year, only supporting the limited first wave of the standard; grab the most developed, if least future-proof option and enter the market early with enhanced 802.16d systems; or wait for the second wave of 802.16e products, which will feature key additions like MIMO and, driven by large vendor roll-outs, should see significant price competition, but which could be unavailable for another year?
Announcements like Sprint's of its 802.16e plans have given credibility to the standard and increased operator willingness to invest, but for those that want to start to build out before mid-2007, the choices are all sub-optimal, certainly if the service provider is planning mobile multimedia offerings and so really needs to take advantage of second wave characteristics like MIMO combined with beamforming to gain the best cost of delivery and functionality.
For those who opt for pre-certified or first wave 802.16e, there will be few choices that include both MIMO and beamforming, for instance. Many of the large vendors, while talking up their homegrown 802.16e wares, will actually wait until wave two to launch these, and in the meantime will continue to rely on OEM deals, a halfway house that will not lead to rapid price erosion (Nortel, for instance, will ship its MIMO enabled WiMAX in the third quarter of next year, and until then continues to offer Airspan's systems).
Without MIMO and beamforming, it is hard to achieve key operator objectives such as effective indoor penetration without the need for very dense base station build-out. Early indoor devices have been disappointing in this respect, a factor that may have led to the scaling back of Airspan's flagship project with Japan's Yozan.
Some vendors are starting to implement these technologies even before wave two, often at the behest of a sought-after customer - SR Telecom has shipped products with indoor coverage using its own adaptive antenna technologies, partly to keep hold of its large Telefonica contract for wireless access in Spain.
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