Wednesday, July 28, 2010

LTE vs. WIMAX: The Race to 4G

LTE vs. WIMAX: The Race to 4G 

2010 marks a pivotal year for the telecommunications industry. Not only is it the beginning of a new decade, but it’s also the beginning of a new era in terms of connecting to others. It’s a critical juncture of technology, it’s an evolution: the 4th generation. Competing companies such as Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T all have a role in producing this 4th generation. They have sunk massive amounts of commerce in the development of their own version of the technology but as of now, none of these companies are capable of producing the finalized product. Though each company has set their approximate nation-wide release year, which is 2013, as well as their estimation as to how many consumers will be connected to their 4G networks, roughly 100 million, none of the companies have commercially marketed their product to the public. There hasn’t been any newspaper articles or television commercials about the product, and trying to find information on their websites is pretty much a fool’s errand. It seems that the 4th generation of connectivity isn’t as ready as these companies portrait it to be.

Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint are the companies leading the way for this new product. They exude confidence during technology fairs concluding that the 4G revolution is upon us. They’ve developed products to help connect to the network such as portable modems, usb drives, and sim cards. They’ve even entitled their networks; Sprint’s being WIMAX (World-wide Interoperability for Microwave Access) while Verizon and AT&T’s shall be called LTE (Long Term Evolution). However, perhaps their confidence is missed guided and their promise of debuting in 2013 is unrealistic.

WIMAX developed by the Sprint and Clear companies respectively, seems to be losing ground in the United States amidst their attempt to bring WIMAX success domestically. Though they’ve raised 3.2 billion dollars in investments to produce the network, Sprint and Clear may have underestimated how expensive it is to blanket the country in connectivity. Sprint, the lesser of the three major telecommunications distributors in the country, may not have enough currency to continue production if the 3.2 billion isn’t enough, and investors Google, Time Warner, and Intel may grow weary of waiting and pull their investments early. Also those dependent on their WIMAX’s success is far less than those who are dependent on LTE”s success due to the fact that Verizon and AT&T are far larger companies. If it were a track race, Sprint is trying to take a shortcut by cutting through the field while Verizon and AT&T have already lapped them. If Sprint’s WIMAX fails, it can be attributed to the fact that their company just isn’t ready or wealthy enough.

LTE developed by Verizon and AT&T is also having trouble breaking ground in the telecommunications industry. Though it has run several tests, and covers almost an equal amount of area that WIMAX does, it is far less mature. It is faster than 3G but is however slower than Clear’s WIMAX. Also the infrastructure of the technology is underdeveloped which can be fixed over time. The problem with LTE is the fact that the company is trying to rush the development of the 4th Generation network so that it isn’t overshadowed by WIMAX. LTE wants to be the fist to release their network in order to compete but at the same time it’s detrimental to the process of developing the technology.

The competition between companies seems to be unhealthy for their product. If they rush development to meet the deadline they set for themselves, it may lead to an unfinished, underdeveloped, product and lead to more problems than solutions. It is essential to that these companies slow the process down so that the network they establish is without problems and inconvenience in the future.



Related LTE posts:

Will HP bring the Palm Webos software to the 4G LTE ng connect program ecosystem?
to communicate with and integrate all the world  web devices  and applications ?




  

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