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WiMAXComplete Guide ToTELEPHONYS

THE BUSINESS CASE FOR SERVICE PROVIDER DEPLOYMENT ][5.31.04

A SUPPLEMENT TO TELEPHONY> INSIDE: EXCLUSIVE COMMENTARY FROM THE WiMAX FORUM


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May 31,2004 TELEPHONY 2 TELEPHONY May 31,2004

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EDITORSLETTER

WiMAX DEFINED

CONTENTS

Something wasstill missing.Wedecided it wasnecessary toprovide furtheredification aboutWiMAX to thebroader serviceprovider population.

T

BY JASON MEYERSWWW.TELEPHONYONLINE.COM

For the latest on the continuing evolution

of WiMAX technology and standardization

efforts,visit our Web site at

ONTHE WEB:

The idea for this supplement was hatched earlier this year during the Broad-band Wireless World Forum,where members of the editorial and publishingstaffofTelephony had several discussions with representatives from thebroadband wireless sector about the industrys perceptionsand,perhapsmore important, misconceptionsabout WiMAX.

One of the sessions during that conference assembled a group ofexper tsfrom broadband wireless vendors to discuss precisely that: What is WiMAX?How is it being developed,and what are the potential benefits for serviceproviders? What are its technological strengths, and what challenges remainto be addressed? When will it become a standard? What does its future hold?

The subject seemed well-received by those in attendancethe panel did agood job of addressing the topic for a broadband wireless audience.

But we felt something was still missing:We decided it was necessary toprovide further edification about WiMAX to the broader ser vice providerpopulationa phrase that also definesTelephonysreadership. We ap-proached the WiMAX Forum to gain its support,its sponsorship and thesponsorship of several of its members,and this supplement was born.

The result is a comprehensive and objective guide to the past, present andfuture of WiMAX.Our editors and writers went behind the hype aboutWiMAX to explore its true potential, define the role it is likely to play in vari-ous versions and applications, and discover what industry,technological andregulatory challenges must still be confronted before the technology can be-come a true broadband contender.We provide what we believe to be themost complete primer yet on the development and evolution of the 802.16technology and standard.We also handicap the service provider opportuni-ties that exist for WiMAX,both domestically and internationally, and in both

licensed and unlicensed spectrum bands.And we close by offering theWiMAX Forum the opportunity to provide its perspective on the future.

As the content of this supplement makes clear,WiMAX is absolutely stillin its nascent stage.But the research that went into the production of thissupplement tells us t hat the technologys potential is also clear.We will con-tinue to provide you with the most up-to-the-minute coverage of WiMAXand any and all other telecom technology innovationas it evolves.W

FEATURES04A Standard Argument:Why WiMAX Will RuleBy Dan OShea.An in-depth look athow members of the WiMAX Forumare plotting the evolution of the 802.16

format toward a standard,commerciallyviable broadband technology.Includesa breakdown of the features of variousrevisions of the technology.

10The License GameBy Kevin Fitchard.Whats the potentialof WiMAX in licensed frequency bands?Before that question can be answered,the internationally complicated mazeof spectrum rules and regulationsmust first be deciphered.

14Unlicensed RebornBy Nancy Gohring. License-exemptspectrum was once notorious for being

untamed,unreliable and unusable forbroadband wireless deployment. Now,even well-established larger operatorsare appreciating its advantagesto thebenefit of those backing WiMAX.

COMMENTARY18The WiMAX Bridgeto BroadbandBy Ron Resnick.The president of theWiMAX Forum outlines the historyof the groups activity,the challengestackled and the road ahead.


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May 31,2004 TELEPHONY 5

one industry cooperative to shape anintentionally vague standard intosomething more marketable andmalleable to mass deployment.

That trench work, much like the

work of the Wi-Fi Alliance, mainlyconsists of devising specificationsfor product interoperability across awide range of equipment vendorsand overseeing testing of the prod-ucts at third-party labs in order tocertify them for interoperability.

In another nod to the Wi-Fi Al-liance, the WiMAX Forum aims tobecome a marketing collective,pro-moting WiMAX Forum Certifiedproducts,first to operators that willuse the technology in their transportnetworks,and later to end users.

But WiMAX proponents want toadvance to that stage of near ubiq-uity without getting tripped up by

some of the hurdles Wi-Fi faced,such as a sub-par security protocol.

The original 802.11 [Wi-Fi] specwas a dismal failure, said Jeff Orr,product marketing manager atP roxi m and a member of th eWiMAX Forums board of directors.All of the vendors interpreted thatspec differently. There was wirelessLAN equipment in the market wellbefore there were standards. It wasvery expensive,and there was no in-teroperability.

With that in mind,WiMAX is al-ready ahead of the game.

We have a standard, and were at

the early stage of figuring out howwe support WiMAX,how we makeit grow,said Dean Chang,chairmanof the WiMAX Forums serviceprovider working group and direc-tor of product marketing at vendorAperto Networks.The forum helpsbring all the information together

that vendors and carriers can workwith to do that.

A

s Chang pointed out, it allbegins with a standard.

The standard he spoke ofis 802.16a, which was ap-proved by the IEEE in January 2003,and is basically an amendment tothe more general 802.16 core stan-dard developed in December 2001by IEEE Task Group 1.

The core 802.16 specification wasan air interface standard for broad-band wireless access systems usingpoint-to-multipoint infrastructuredesigns, and operating at radio fre-

quencies between 10 GHz and 66GHz. It targeted an average band-width performance of 70 Mb/s andpeak rates up to 268 Mb/s.

However, that standard wasntcomplete in many peoplesminds.Itapplied only to line-of-sight deploy-ment in licensed spectrum, neg-lected to offer any conformanceguidelines and ignored ongoing de-velopment of the similar EuropeanHiperMAN standard.

The original spec isnt so all-encompassing, Orr said.The IEEEwas working quickly, as it typicallydoes, and with 802.16a it built morefunctionality into that original draft.

The 802.16a collection ofamendments took into account theemergence of licensed and license-

exempt broadband wireless net-works operating between 2 GHzand 11 GHz,w ith support for non-line-of-sight architectures thatcould not be supported in higher

frequency ranges.Support for NLOS performancewas one of primary PHY [physicallayer] differences in 802.16a,Changsaid.802.16a was developed withthe requirements of lower frequen-cies in mind.

In 802.16a, there were actuallythree new PHY-layer specifications:a single-carrier layer; a 256-pointFFT OFDM layer;and a 2048-pointFFT OFDMA layer. The 256-point

waveform is the one that is employedin both WiMAX and the ETSIsHiperMAN standard, ensuringworldwide interoperability.

The amended standard also al-lowed for WiMAX deployment invarying channel capacities to ad-dress the different amounts of spec-trum carriers own from market tomarket,and in different parts of theworld. The inclusion of TDD andFDD duplexing was yet another

nod to the technologys interna-tional potential.

Beside the additions at the PHYlayer,the 802.16a version made fur-ther enhancements to the Media Ac-cess Control (MAC) layer.The MACgained a slotted TDMA uplink/downlink protocol between the

There is much work still to be done.For all the industry hope and hype

placed on WiMAX,it remains todayin an early,pre-market stage.

4 TELEPHONY May 31,2004

>

WiMAX is not Wi-Finot yet, any-waybut the next evolution inbroadband wireless has set off downWi-Fis well-worn path.Wi-Fi, basedon the 802.11 standard,once claimedonly a sparse,polka dot pattern of hotspots around the globe,but that pat-tern is becoming denser by the day,much faster than wireline broadbandtechnologies could ever match. Its

success has given proponents ofbroadband wireless access,whose vi-sions of success have proved miragesbefore,reason to hope again.

But if Wi-Fi has resuscitated theirdreams, WiMAX might be the tech-nology that fully realizes them.

Three years after the original802.16 draft was forged by the IEEE,

backers of the technology are nowworking with a much-improved,amended standard: 802.16a, orWiMAX. They are hoping to modelWiMAXs evolution after that of itswildly successful and more mature

predecessor.The similarities in theirmethods are clear.

First, they chose a market-friendlymoniker that reminds one of Wi-Fibut suggests something bettersomething new and improved.WiMAX forces have even adopted themodel of a progressiveand aggres-siveindustry trade group set forthby the Wi-Fi Alliance. This group,

called the WiMAX Forum,already ishelping the industry interpret andmodify the original, loosely-scripted802.16 standard, and is preparing aninteroperability testing program thatwill ensure a broad choice of fairlypriced equipment for carriers andother service providers that would de-ploy the technology in their transport

networks at a savings of capital andoperational expenses.

Next, WiMAX will target the enduser, with the backing of Intel andother semiconductor developers thatcan get WiMAX chips into a range of

laptops and other customer premisesequipment.

Sound familiar? In fact,it might besaid that the only thing WiMAX wonttake from Wi-Fi is the one thing thatcould give WiMAX an even betterchance for rapid market adoption:WiMAX will have a basis in well-de-fined standards and industry interop-erability right from the start,which is

something that Wi-Fi didnt fully gainfor years after it was developedandsomething that might have ultimatelylimited Wi-Fis market acceptance.

Before standardization, Wi-Fiwas nothing like it is today: insideevery new laptop,said Ron Resnick,director of Intels broadband wirelessdivision and president of the WiMAXForum.It was a technology that hadonly a very small market impact.

But before the grand vision can berealized,there is much work still to bedone.For all of the industry hope andhype that has been placed at the feetof WiMAX, the technology remains

today in an early,pre-market stage.Mustering the broad array of ven-

dors and service providers fromaround the world that will contribute tothat success is the WiMAX Forum,comprised of more than 100 compa-nies.Advancing the technology to mar-ket depends largely on the ability ofthat

MEMBERS OF THE WiMAX FORUM ARE WORKING TOGETHERTO CAREFULLY PLOT THE EVOLUTION OF 802.16 FROM A VAGUESTANDARD INTO A MARKETABLE TECHNOLOGY. COMMON AMBITIONAND EXPERIENCE DEPLOYING Wi-Fi SERVE AS THEIR GUIDE RAILS.

A STANDARD ARGUMENT:

WiMAX will have a basis in well-definedstandards and industry interoperabilityright from the start,which is somethingWi-Fi didnt fully gain for years after it

was developed.

WHY WIMAX WILL RULE

]BY DAN OSHEA


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QOS details,Chang said.While carrier input might be most

significant in molding a technologythat meets all the requirements ofcommercial networks, the WiMAXForums work ultimately must recog-

nize opinions coming from a varietyof companies ofall sizes from acrossthe industry and around the world.The group has 23 carrier members,but the rest of the more than 100firms involved are vendors of net-work equipment,access products,software and chipsets.

The reality of standards work isthat people from across the industryare getting together face to faceabout once a quarter with calls ande-mails in between, said CarltonONeal,vice president of marketingat Alvarion.The best thing you canhave in that situation are a couple ofcompanies that are leading the effort

in a way thats not controlling, buthelps keep things on t rack.

The forum has reacted well to itsgrowth [during] the last year or so,said Stephane Cohen,vice presidentof marketing at SR Telecom and atechnical director ofthe forum.

The forum has been able to makemuch progress on developing its in-teroperability testing suites. Inde-pendent labs will be hired to con-duct the initial testing that will takeplace in the third quarter.Afterward(possibly in November or Decem-ber) the forum will hold plugfests,events at which the first products up

for WiMAX certificationproba-bly about five or six different prod-ucts from multiple vendorswillinterface in live demonstrations.

To get to the plugfest stage is theprimary focus of the forum rightnow,said Gordon Antonello,seniortechnical advisor at Wi-LAN,and a

member of the forum board of di-rectors. That will happen by veryearly next year.

The first round of product certi-fications will be released shortlyafter the plugfest, and the WiMAX

market will be offand running.

The testing and certificationprocesses that are occur-ring under the WiMAXForums guidance puts the

technology in the best possible po-sition it can be in for broad market

adoption, giving service providers

WiMAX base station and the sub-scriber terminal.This type of intelli-gent scheduling of user access to thenetwork improves latency,affectingthe network capability to supportvoice and video services, and overall

service reliability.Other QOS featuresinclude automatic retransmission re-quest (ARQ),per-connection QOSand automatic power control.

802.16a gave us a better set ofMAC and PHY profiles to work w ith,Chang said.

While 802.16a does much to im-prove on the original standard, thecore standard has had enoughamendments attached to it that theIEEE is now re-drafting the specifica-tion.The new standard,to be referredto as 802.16 Revision D, should beready in the third quarter of this year.The new core spec will include every-thing thats changed about the stan-

dard thus far.Yet the evolution of the WiMAX

standard still wont be finished with802.16 RevD.By late next year,the IEEEhopes to produce 802.16e,another newamendment that will introduce mobil-ity into what WiMAX proponentshope by that time will be a thrivingmarket for broadband wireless.

Though WiMAX is not yetmarket-ready, 2004 is a piv-otal year for the technology.Ifthe 802.16 standard is on a

journey to broad market adoption,the 802.16a amendments and 802.16

RevD draft are just brief stops on the journey, opportunities to make surethe industry has the most detailed,most current roadmap to get to itsdestination. Following that thinking,the WiMAX Forum is 802.16s guideto market.

The forum is a reflection in time

of where the standards are, Resnicksaid.They arent stagnant, and theforum addresses what happens asthey continue to evolve.

Parallel to the development of theoriginal 802.16 standard, the group

was founded in 2001. It picked upsteam with last years approval of802.16a.While it began with member-ship from just a few vendors, theWiMAX Forum has grown rapidly inthe last year, most impressively in itsservice provider ranks.

Recruiting carriers to the forum isa very active process, said forumpresident Resnick.Were early in theprocess of getting the technology tomarket, but industry analysts havestarted covering this area, and carri-ers are wanting to join the forum tosee who is building what.

Apertos Chang said it is more im-portant to get carriers involved at the

early stages of WiMAXs developmentthan it was to get them involved in Wi-Fi, because WiMAXs early successwill depend most on the ease withwhich they can deploy it in their owntransport networks.

In the long-term future,WiMAXindeed will become a last-mile accesstechnology integrated in laptops andother end-user devices, but in thevery near term, it probably will havethe most viability for backhauling therapidly increasing volumes of trafficbeing generated by Wi-Fi hot spots.

The first purpose for involvingcarriers was to educate them about

the technology, Chang said.Thenext was to pump them for informa-tion on functional requirements thatneeded to be in the standard.

Besides contributing to the newMAC and PHY profiles, carriers alsoare helping the forum devise a man-agement document with additional


>

By next year,the IEEE hopesto produce802.16e,another newamendmentthat will introducemobility intowhat WiMAXproponentshopeby that time to bea thriving marketfor broadbandwireless.

][


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Intel and the Intel logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries.Copyright 2004. Intel Corporation. All rights reserved. *Other brands and names may be claimed by their respective owners.

Intel is creating thetechnology building

blocks for WiMAX today.With the WiMAX Forum,*

were helping createmarket demand for

tomorrow. Were goingthe extra mile, so we

can all go the last mile.

www.intel.com/go/wimax

WiMAX:Connecting theNext Five Billion Users

This is something that will defi-nitely get the interest of mobile carri-ers, Resnick said.EV-DO is slowerthan WiMAX. Look for 802.16e toreach market deployment sometimein late 2006 or 2007.

For the time being, WiMAX pro-ponents are hopeful about theprospect for broad market deploy-ment,but they are also trying to keepthat hope from mutating into toomuch hype.Its in the backs of every-ones minds that over-investment,too much marketing hype and exor-bitant product cost were among thefactors that killed offa previous gen-eration of broadband wireless serv-ice providers.

Some of the companies that

started the 802.16 effort are no longeraround,ONeal said.

But WiMAX Forum members be-lieve the mistakes of the past havehelped them contribute to a detailed,revised standard and a product certi-

fication plan that broadband wirelessdidnt have before.This time around,Wi-Fi also exists

as a last mile complement that pavesthe way for WiMAX. Conceptually,broadband wireless will now be anincremental value on top of some-thing thats already out there,ONealsaid.It will be a natural extension.

Eventually,WiMAX w ill transitionfrom complementary status as Wi-Fistransport partner to a potential Wi-Fialternative.Its difficult to say when or

how effectively that may happen,withthe Wi-Fi hot spot boom continuingunabated for now. However,t radi-tional telecom carriers are the mostnotable parties not to have partici-pated in that boom thus far.

Big carriers havent made hugecommitments to Wi-Fi,said SR Tele-coms Cohen.These carriers eventu-ally could choose between Wi-Fi andWiMAX,but WiMAX is not ad-vanced enough yet that its forcing thedecision.

On top of the work thats alreadybeen done on WiMAX,it might takesome luck to make that happenbutyou know what they say about luck.

Luck, ONeal said,is whenpreparation meets opportunity.W


>

more affordable prices and assur-ances that they can create multi-ven-dor,plug-and-play networks.

But market success itself is not as-

sured. Though analysts believe theWiMAX market will be worth any-where from $2 billion to $5 billion by2009, the defining aspects of that an-ticipated growth remain to be pin-pointed.Its very likely that the initialservice providers adopting WiMAXnext year will be wireless ISPs,manyof whom already are demanding pre-

certified products from vendors.Six months ago,a lot of the WISPs

saw WiMAX coming, and some ofthem said they wouldnt buy anything

else until they could get WiMAXequipment, said SR TelecomsCohen.Theyre ready to deploy any-thing that will evolve to WiMAX cer-

tification because they feel it givesthem a competitive advantage.

International carriers and licensedCLECs could be next to deploy.Cohen said larger carriers will takelonger to adopt the technologyperhaps in 2006. Theyll bring solu-tions in-house to administer theirown batteries of tests before follow-

ing with field trials, and eventuallycommitting to deployment.

The size oft hose deployments willbe one of the most critical factors in

WiMAXs evolution. The technologyhas detractors who believe that prod-uct certifications will take longerthan the forum hopes, that service

providers will be fickle to WiMAXonce those products are commer-cially available, and that WiMAX ul-timately could prove to be of onlylimited potential as a broadband gap-filler in carrier networks.

WiMAX proponents believe af-fordability, ease of installation andinteroperability will prove otherwise.

WiMAX will be much easier forcarriers to install and roll out thanpast broadband wireless access,Cohen said.

Alvarions ONeal added that forwireline telcos, WiMAX could proveless costly and easier to install than

DSL, and that the progress toward802.16es mobile capability could helpthem compete better with the mobilecarriers to which they are increasinglylosing customers.Also,WiMAX withmobility could provide a broadbandevolution for mobile carriers thathave not yet decided about 3G.

]

IEEE 802.16 Standard

WiMAX has detractorswho believeproduct certifications will take longer,that service providers will be fickle toWiMAX once products are available,

and that WiMAX ultimately couldprove to be of only limited potential.

Completed

Spectrum

Channel Conditions

Bit Rate

Modulation

Mobility

Channel Bandwidths

Typical Cell Radius

802.16 802.16a/REVd 802.16e

Dec. 2001 802.16a: Jan 2003 Estimate: 2nd half of2005802.16 REVd: Q3 2004

10 to 66 GHz < 11 GHz < 6 GHz

Line-of-sight only Non line-of-sight Non line-of-sight

32 to 134Mb/s at Up to 75 Mb/s at Up to 15 Mb/s at

28 MHz channelization 20 MHz channelization 5 MHz channelization

QPSK, 16 QAM and 64 QAM OFDM 256, OFDMA Same as REVd64QAM, 16 QAM, QPSK, BPSK

Fixed Fixed and Portable Mobility, Regional Roaming

20, 25 and 28 MHz Selectable channel bandwidths Same as REVdbetween1.25 and 20 MHz,with up to 16 logical sub-channels

1 to 3 miles 3 to 5 miles; Maximum range 30 miles 1 to 3 milesbased on tower height, antenna gain andtransmit power (among other parameters)

Source:Wi MAX Forum


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enforce their use-it or-lose-itpoli-cies,creating a new breed of providerin the process.

Ireland is one of the countries thathas begun redistributing its 3.5 GHzspectrum,taking it back from thebig carriers and holding companiesthat let it lie untouched for years andhanding it out free to smaller com-panieswith the only conditionsbeing they actually have a wirelessbusiness plan and execute it. LeapBroadbands original plan was to de-ploy broadband wireless over theunlicensed 5.8 GHz frequencies,butwhen the government redistribu-tion was announced,it immediately jumped on the opportunity.

Licensed spectrum is alwayspreferable to unlicensed,said Char-lie Ardagh, director of Leap Broad-band,but not always for the reasons

you might think.We were having no trouble with

the unlicensed bands,Ardagh said.Theres just a perception that li-censed spectrum is more robustthan unlicensed spectrum. Thetruth is theyre equally robust.

But the industry being in the nas-cent state that is,perceptionses-pecially those of your financialbackers and your perspective cus-tomersare important, and theability to market a wireless servicefree from interference and crowdingis a key competitive tactic that Leapand other smaller players are taking

full advantage of,Ardagh said.Leap is just one ofdozens of what

is emerging as a new breed ofsmaller broadband wireless carriersin Europe,created out ofthe suddenavailability of the 3.5 GHz bandsand Europes steep leased-lineprices.While many ofthese carriers

are still on small-scale deployments(Leap has only deployed in Dublinso far),the WiMAX specification fi-

nalization could trigger a boom forthese small carriers,followed by de-ployments from the larger, morewell-funded carriers currently sit-ting on their spectrum,said AlanMenezes,v ice president of market-ing for Aperto Networks,the vendor

and forum member supplying Leapand other European carriers with3.5 GHz gear.

The volume opportunity forWiMAX just on the baseband sidewill be immense, Dean said.Buy-ing a laptop that will basically beready to work on any of these net-works will be an enormous advan-tage.And there are enough carriers


>

Churning in the backwaters of theWiMAX imagination,away from all ofthe attention and glamour the tech-nology is gathering,lies the specter ofthe licensed bands.WiMAX has givenhope that all of this spectrumrun-ning the gamut from 700 MHz to ashigh as 66 GHzmay some day beused for broadband wireless access,living up to its original promise and

hopefully the exorbitant price tagscarriers paid for it.

The problem is that the licensed fre-quencies are a mishmash of differentbands, each with separately regulatedchannel requirements and vastly dif-ferent propagation characteristics andpower requirements.To make mattersworse,the diversity ofthe licensed fre-quencies isnt just spread across thespectrum chartits spread across thegeographic map.

Broadband wireless spectrumvaries from government to govern-ment, with very little harmonizationacross continents. Even where com-

mon spectrum exists,individual coun-tries often apply different regulationon how that spectrum can be used.

Navigating the mess of interna-tional spectrum policy to bring the li-censed frequencies into the WiMAXfold will be difficult. Thats why theWiMAX Forum isnt even going to try.

Theres simply no easy way to dothis, said Mohammed Shakouri,vicepresident of the WiMAX Forum andassistant vice president ofbusiness de-velopment Alvarion. The mishmashof spectrum is too much to overcome.That is why we are selecting a fewbands that meet the worlds needs,andweve formed a regulatory group thatwill work towards harmonization.

Essentially, the WiMAX Forum is

concentrating on two critical bands:the 2.5 GHz or MMDS band,and 3.5GHzby far the most abundantbroadband spectrum allocated acrossborders.While there are other bandsunder considerationand, techni-

cally, WiMAX could support themallthe forum and most ofits vendormembers have chosen to concentratetheir energies on those two bands.

After all, WiMAX is intended to bea specification that enables volumesales through standardization. Thegoal is to generate a lot a buzz about afew spectral bands rather than little in-terest in numerous bands.

We think that these few spectrumprofiles will meet most of the worldsneeds,Shakouri said.So far,weve hadpositive response. Were getting ap-proached by many governments thatwant to know how they can help uswork toward harmonization.We wontbe able to get to everyone,but theseprofiles should be common enoughthat we can get 90% of the world.

The impact of licensed spec-trum on WiMAX is mostlikely to be felt internation-ally,where the 3.5 GHz band

is not only commonly distributed

across borders but also handed out bymany governments. After the Euro-pean auctions ofbroadband spectrumin the early 2000s, governments nettedbillions but most of that spectrumhas sat idle as broadband wireless tech-nologies fell flat oftheir faces.

Some governments have decided to

WHILE NO ONE CAN ARGUE THE BENEFITS OF OWNING SPECTRUMIN THE ACCESS BUSINESS, THE WORLDWIDE SPECTRUM TABLEAUIS GIVING WiMAX ITS FAIR SHARE OF COMPLICATIONS.

THE LICENSE GAMEBY KEVIN FITCHARD

Licensed spectrumis a mishmashof different bands,with separatelyregulated channelrequirements.The diversity isnt

just spread acrossthe spectrummapits spreadacross continents.

]

> AVERAGENUMBER OFCPEs PER BASE STATION

sNumber of CPEs per base station

48 48 5166

84

2004 2005 2006 2007 2008

90

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0

Source:Maravedis


7/10

holding the spectrum that 3.5 GHzwill have a lot more options thanother frequencies.

A

s is the case with so manyother wireless technologies,the U.S. is unique when itcomes to broadband wire-

less potential. While the rest of theworld is jumping on 3.5 GHz,regula-tion has kept those bands off of thetable.While there is discussion at theFCC of opening up the similar 3.6GHz band,most of the U.S.s hopes liein the 2.5 GHz MMDS held by Sprintand Nextel,which as yet have not an-nounced their plans.

The U.S.,however, is the worldssingle largest market,and WiMAX is

expected to have a singular impactdomesticallybut most of that im-pact is expected to be in the unli-censed bands.

The problem with the U.S. is thatthere isnt a large amount of licensedspectrum,and what spectrum there isremains allocated along a diverse

range of the spectrum chart.Addi-tionally,the majority of licenses in anyparticular band are owned by a fewnational carriers, many of whombecause of their position on the spec-trum chartwill be left out if WiMAXmeets its lofty expectations.

Standards are great, but how stan-dard can you get?said Mel Levine,di-rector of wireless broadband for Bell-South, which owns a good deal ofspectrum in t he WCS band.Weveheard talk of deploying WiMAX allthe way up to 8, 9, even 10 GHz.WiMAX seems like a great idea, buteventually everything has to conformto the laws of physics. Thats usuallywhere the issues start breaking down.

The difficulties involved in deploy-

As the broadband wireless industry gets

behind the new WiMAX standard, Aperto

Networks PacketWave BWA technology keeps

looking ahead. With comprehensive QoS that

enables highly intelligent traffic classification.

Dynamic per-subscriber link optimization that

maximizes coverage and capacity. And core

networking functionalitythat delivers unparal-

leled scalability, flexibility and cost-efficiency

in the 2.5, 3.5 and 5 GHz bands.

Thats PacketWave. From Aperto

Networks, a WiMAX Forum

founding board member.

WE COULD SEE THIS ONE COMING.

SO WE DESIGNED FOR IT.

Bringing Broadband Within Easy Reach

1637 South Main Street, Milpitas, CA 95035

Phone 408.719.9977, Fax 408.719.9970

www.apertonet.com

ing WiMAX in licensed frequenciesin the U.S. dont appear to have im-peded the interest of carriersspec-trum license-holders and non-hold-ers alike.Companies as diverse as XOCommunications (which holdsLMDS spectrum, well beyond thecurrent scope of the WiMAX Forumsefforts) and Qwest Communicationshave joined the forum, along withcompanies like Covad, which hasnever held,bid on or even discussedbroadband wireless deploymentplans in the past.

Covad,looking for alternate accesssolutions to reach homes and busi-nesses behind remote terminals, istesting pre-WiMAX technology withunnamed partners over both li-

censed and unlicensed frequencieslater this year.

All we can say for certain is werelooking at WiMAX as a fill-in tech-nology, said Ron Marquardt, techni-cal director for Covad.Were not

about to go out and spend $5 billionpurchasing our spectrum coveringthe U.S.,but ifits possible to purchase,lease or partner with companies in aparticular market,this could be a veryexciting technology for us.W


>

The difficultiesof deployingWiMAX in licensedfrequencies dont

appear to haveimpeded theinterest of carriers.

]

s 80,910 106,981 132,153 191,622 297,344 406,767

s 20,228 31,465 48,456 72,684 118,938 235,497

s 89,900 129,007 185,014 277,521 499,538 899,169

s 33,713 47,198 74,887 118,938 273,557 599,446

CPE SHIPMENTS BY FREQUENCYs Unlicensed bands (900 MHz, 2.4 GHz and 5.8 GHz)

s 700 MHz, 1.9 GHz and 10.5 GHz

s 3.5 GHz

s 2.3 GHz and2.5 to 2.7 GHz

s Unlicensed bands(900 MHz, 2.4GHzand5.8GHz)

s 700MHz, 1.9GHzand10.5 GHz

s 3.5GHz

s 2.3 GHz and

2.5to 2.7GHz

s 80,910 106,981 132,153 191,622 297,344

s 20,228 31,465 48,456 72,684 118,938

s 89,900 129,007 185,014 277,521 499,538

s 33,713 47,198 74,887 118,938 273,557

BASE STATION SHIPMENTSBY FREQUENCY

Source:

Maravedis

Source:Maravedis


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World's Leader in

Broadband Wireless

BreezeMAXTM

Alvarions WiMAX solution

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www.alvarion.com

Industry leadership in sales, customers, products,

and technologyMore worldwide experience deploying over 1.5million units

Solutions that work for all customers

Partnerships with over 200 companies in 130 countr

First to announce with Intel, first to widely deployWiMAX systems

WiMAX is the New Standard for the BWAIndustry. So Why Alvarion?

Please come see us at Booth #313 at WCA (Washington DC, June 1-4), or at Boothin the South Hall at Supercomm (Chicago, June 20-24), to understand how we areour market leading position toward the widespread adoption of standard BWA pro

Today and Tomorrow, Alvarion is the Clear Ch

Theyve experienced the upsides and thedownsides to using unlicensed spectrumfirsthand.The downside to unlicensed istheres no cost of entry,so anyone who hasa Linksys can go in and hook it up,said KenUpcraft, executive vice president at UsurfAmericas, a broadband wireless serviceprovider in Colorado and Arizona.

Usurf has had problems with competingin frequencies with people who put up net-works without planning or thinking aboutothers who may already be using the spec-trum. But clearly the benefits to unlicensedspectrum make the business worthwhile.The upside is, its free,Upcraft said.

Unlicensed spectrum users may alsohave some advantages over licensed users.Unlicensed frequencies can allow operatorsto quickly meet the needs of customers whomay ask to start using broadband accesswithin a very short timeframe.The re-sponsiveness with license-exempt is very

important to certain customers,said KevinSuitor, vice president of business develop-ment for Redline Communications.

Unlicensed users also may have access tomore spectrum.In license-exe mpt,youre in-terference-bound. In licensed spectrum,youre spect rum-bound.You only have a fin iteamount that you pay a lot for and you need touse that to its greatest extent,said Suitor.

NextWeb, the operator of broad-band wireless services in Califor-nia, expects WiMAX to help outwith some of the challenges

around using unlicensed frequencies.Part of the WiMAX effort is to look at

ways to move around interference and noisein an RF environment,said Dave Williams,vice president of marketing and businessdevelopment for NextWeb.

Many WISPs are using proprietaryequipment,often based on the 802.11 stan-dard,and they are anxiously awaiting the ar-


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Scrappy start-ups have long beenhappy to use unlicensed spectrum todeliver broadband wireless Internetservices, particularly in underservedareas.That class of operator stands tobenefit by using WiMAX in the sameunlicensed frequencies that have be-come their lifeblood.

But the large,established operatorshave traditionally turned their noses

up at unlicensed spectrum as beingunreliable and thus unusable.Thatsbeginning to change, and many ex-perts expect to see large operatorsbuilding WiMAX networks in the un-licensed bands.

But despite the interest in buildingWiMAX networks in unlicensed spec-trum in the United States, operatorslarge and small will have to wait forcertified gear. Vendors see the mostdollar signs in international markets,so regions outside the United Stateswill be the first to reap the benefits ofWiMAX equipment.

WiMAX has Wi-Fi tothank for a growingthough limited accept-ance of u nl icensed

bands from the large carriers.Traditional carriers are getting

more comfortable with certain uses ofunlicensed spectrum, said Kevin

Kahn, Intel senior fellow and co-di-rector of Intels communicationstechnology lab.Carriers that operateWi-Fi hot spots have become muchmore savvy about what unlicensedmight be good for.

But even though the major carri-erswired and wirelessare grow-ing more open to the unlicensed fre-quencies,Kahn thinks that comfort

zone only extends to using the bandsin rural areas.Unlicensed is a solutionthat makes good sense in rural de-ployments and in developing coun-tries,he said.

Others agree.Broadband in unli-

censed has matured to the point where

its not just the entrepreneurial ISPdoing it,but it is the larger carrier withthe caveat that theyre limiting it torural areas, said Carlton ONeal,vicepresident of marketing for Alvarion.

British Telecom, for example,hasdiscussed using wireless in unlicensedfrequencies to deliver broadband

services in rural areas.Covad, AT&Tand Qwest have all joined the WiMAXForum, and none has licensed spec-trum for WiMAX,so if they deploy thetechnology it likely would be in unli-censed bands.

But none of the major U.S. opera-tors has actually pledged to useWiMAX or described their hopes indetail. How theyre going to do it is

still uncertain, said Michael Cai, asenior analyst with Parks Associated.An operator like Covad could use un-licensed spectrum to build an entirenew network.Or,are they going to usethe smaller WISPs that have already

been built and aggregate those net-

works?Cai said.Existing wireless ISPs,whose num-bers,some say,reach in the thousands,dont need convincing of the worth ofunlicensed spectrum. Many of themhave become well-established serviceproviders, delivering high qualitybroadband solutions to businesses.

Wi-Fi LEGITIMATIZED UNLICENSED FREQUENCIES.NOW OPERATORS BIG AND SMALL ARE LOOKINGTO BUILD WiMAX NETWORKS IN THE ONE-TIMENOTORIOUS SPECTRUM BANDS.

BY NANCY GOHRING

The large,established operatorstraditionally turned their noses upat unlicensed spectrum as beingunreliable and unusable. Thatsbeginning to change.

UNLICENSED REBORN

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ification and begins certifying gear.Cai said that WISPs will largely be ac-cepting of such offers.

Redline expects that Western Eu-rope will be its biggest market,fol-lowed closely by China,India and Rus-sia.Canada and the U.S., because ofthe deep penetration ofDSL and cablemodems, are good markets but theywont be the markets that drive thebusiness,s aid Suitor.

Many international markets havemore available licensed spectrum sooperators may use it or a mixture ofli-censed or unlicensed.But regardless ofwhich kind of spectrum is used,somesay that those markets stand to gainthe most from WiMAX.

WiMAX may affect economies in

other parts ofthe world, such as Indiaor China, much more so than here.In a country with reasonably devel-oped wired infrastructure, WiMAXprovides a competitive capability oran advantage for customers, saidIntels Kahn. In developing coun-tries, there are a lot of places wheretheres just no practical way to extendservice economically out to parts ofthe country where even a smallamount of service could have a hugeaffect on the populace.I think thatwireless will be very important as away of getting a first-level service outto important markets.W

Nancy Gohring is a freelance writer based in Seattle

and a former senior editor for Telephony.


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rival ofWiMAX gear.In fact, a recentsurvey of WISPs conducted by ABIResearch showed that more than halfintend to deploy WiMAX equipmentwith the hope of lowering costs,bothof customer premises equipment andbase stations.

The interoperability of WiMAXgear will be one of the biggest bene-fits for NextWeb,which looks forwardto having a wider choice of vendors,said Williams. He also hopes that intime commoditization will decreasethe cost of gear for the operator.Withthat, NextWeb can address a wholenew market. NextWebs network cur-rently covers a potential 50,000 small-and medium-sized businesses, thecompanys target market.

That same coverage is home to 25million households, Williams said.But with the costs today,its prohibi-tive to deliver the carrier class service

we provide to the residential market.Williams said he hopes WiMAX

customer premises equipment willbecome low enough in cost to enableNextWeb to build an overlay networkin its markets and begin targeting res-

idential customers or sell the networkwholesale to a well-known ISP such asAOL or EarthLink.

The main difference for operatorscurrently using proprietary gear willbe quality ofservice mechanisms andbandwidth,said Alvarions ONeal.That means operators can more ag-

gressively offer voice and video serv-ices,said ONeal.While operators canuse current gear to offer voice, itsgood but not great,said ONeal.

In addition, WiMAX equipmentwill be able to handle twice or three

times as much throughput as the cur-rent offerings,which means operatorscan take on more customers.

D

espite the interest inWiMAX from the smallWISPs and some of thelarger operators in the U.S.,

the market here is expected to take aback seat to international markets.The first product that many vendorswill ship will operate in the 3.5 GHzband, which is a licensed band inmany parts ofthe world outside oftheUnited States,said ONeal.

Outside ofthe U.S.,the bands thathave the most traction are the li-censed bands, said Dean Chang,di-rector of product marketing forAperto Networks and chair of theservice provider working group at theWiMAX Forum.

Gear that can be used in unlicensed

spectrum here wont likely be avail-able until late next year or early 2006,said Cai.But companies like Alvarionare selling equipment today that theypledge to upgrade to WiMAX oncethe WiMAX Forum finishes the spec-

]Existing wirelessISPs dont needconvincing of the

worth of unlicensedspectrum. Manyalready are offeringbroadband servicesto businesses.


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WiMAX is not a new technol-ogyit is a more innovative andcommercially viable adaptation of aproven technology that is deliveringbroadband services around theglobal today. In fact, wireless broad-band access systems from WiMAXForum members are already de-ployed in more than 125 countriesaround the world.These leadingequipment providers are on a migra-tion path to WiMAX.

The first generation of WiMAXForum Certified CPEs will be out-door-installable subscriber stationsakin to a satellite dish.These are ex-pected to be available in the first quar-ter of 2005 and priced above $350.The second generation of CPEs willbe indoor-installable modems simi-lar to a cable or DSL modem,will be

priced under $200 and are expectedto be available in the Q3 2005 time-frame.No truck roll will be requiredwith indoor-installable modems.

With the advent ofa standard andeconomies of scale driving downprice and improving performance,many analysts predict a virtual ex-plosion in the market size for broad-band wireless. In fact, In-Stat/MDRforecasts the market will grow tomore than $1.2 billion by 2007.

Perhaps one of the most excitingaspects of WiMAXone with thepotential to make this a significantlybigger marketis the evolution tomobility.The WiMAX Forum isworking aggressively to incorporatemobile capabilities into the 802.16standard by the end of 2004. In the2006 timeframe,we expect that

WiMAX will be incorporated intoend-user devices like notebookcomputers and PDAs along with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth,enabling the deliv-ery of wireless broadband directly tothe end userat home,in the officeand on the move.

In the 2007 timeframe,we expectto see WiMAX integrated into 3Gphones along with Wi-Fi,providinga simplified network connection forvoice and data. The WiMAX Forumis working to drive a common plat-form for harmonization betweenstandards that will enable users to re-main connected wherever they go.

WiMAX has the potential to bethe great equalizer in broadband ac-cess.In short,bridging the gap ofthedigital divide has never been morewithin our reach.W


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May 31,2004 TELEPHONY 19

PPerhaps even before the phrase

digital divide was coined, the tele-com industry has been searching for acost-effective way to bridge the gapbetween the haves and have nots,making broadband services accessibleto all. In the U.S., cable and DSL haveeffectively narrowed the divide, buttheyre not without limitations.

The problem is far more complex in

developing countries, where in somecases vast sectors of the populationhave limited access to even the mostbasic telephone services.

For service providers eager to tapinto these underserved markets,WiMAX holds the promise of deliver-ing broadband services on a ubiqui-tous scale. Though broadband wire-less is not an entirely new technology,the evolution to a standards-based,in-teroperable, carrier-class solutiongives WiMAX the trifecta needed todrive widescale deployment.

Service providers seeking to buildbroadband infrastructure in develop-ing countries should take fiber as far asthey can, then go wireless. WiMAXwill allow these companies to deploymore quickly and at lower costs. Forthose looking to fill the holes in theircable or DSL networks,wireless is themost viable solution.

Accelerating the introduction of

cost-effective broadband wireless ac-cess services into the market is the ul-timate goal of the WiMAX Forum.Theadvent of a standards-based, interop-erable solution will create economiesof scale that will drive price and per-formance to levels unachievable withproprietary equipment.

But a standard alone is not enoughto incite mass adoption of a technol-

ogy.To impact and deliver broadbandas wed like to see it, the industry needsan organization like the WiMAXForum to promote and certify thatproducts put on the market live up tothe promise of interoperability andconformance.

As such, the WiMAX Forum willconduct testing and label vendor sys-tems WiMAX Forum Certified,guar-anteeing that products have been inde-pendently verified to be bothconformant to the standard and inter-operable with other vendor equipment.These systems will be scalable for up tothousands of users, and because oftheir interoperability,service providerswill be able to purchase equipmentfrom more than one vendorreduc-ing investment risk and creating aprice-competitive marketplace.

Some have posed the question,How real is WiMAX?The answer isthat WiMAX is as real as it gets.

BYRON RESNICK

TO BROADBAND

Evolution to astandards-based,interoperable,carrier-classsolution givesWiMAX thetrifecta neededto drive widescaledeployment.

THE WiMAX BRIDGE

president of the WiMAX Forum

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