Ovum paints grim picture for Asia Pacific WiMAX

January 06, 2007

Analysis and consulting firm Ovum is predicting a rough road ahead for fixed and mobile WiMAX, saying both will remain niche technologies in most Asia Pacific markets for the next five years.

In his report WiMAX in Asia: reality bites, analyst Nathan Burley delivers his downbeat estimate for the technology despite the opportunities afforded by uneven fixed and mobile network deployment, and governments eager to latch onto the technology to boost domestic social policy initiatives and export-industry development.

Key to its poor performance is delays in standardising Mobile WiMAX for the mass-market, the report says. With 3GPP technologies being built out fast, the short to medium-term window of opportunity for large scale mobile WiMAX is closing, Ovum says.

It adds that both fixed and mobile WiMAX will remain niche technologies in most markets for the next five years. Beyond this, much depends on the relative volume of WiMAX chipsets built in to consumer electronics, and the extent to which the cellular community can maintain the momentum currently seen with HSPA deployment.

Mobile WiMAX faces considerable barriers to implementation, the report goes on to say, chief among them is the absence of a universally designated spectrum band. The technology is also less specified than comparable 3G broadband technologies and will take time to develop the scale economies essential to compete with 3G.

Despite publicity and trials, few larger mobile operators - especially in developed markets - have committed to large scale commercial deployment of WiMAX as a mobile broadband technology. Ovum says it sees 3GPP technologies (currently high-speed packet access, or HSPA) as the clear leader for wireless broadband in the medium term.

As a result, smaller operators will concentrate on deploying WiMAX in niche markets such rural areas poorly served by fixed DSL or cable.

In developed markets especially, WiMAX will co-exist with 3G/HSPA as fixed operators choose to extend the reach of DSL and possibly as a fixed substitute in cities.

Ovum says that in established 3G/HSPA markets, mobile WiMAX will need to demonstrate superior service or vastly cheaper prices in order to gain widespread take-up - something it sees as unlikely in the short to medium term.

Article by Ken Lewis for m-net.