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| reply to neufuse
Re: maybe because said by neufuse:there is no competition? overseas there are Multple wi-max providers.... why is it only clearwire doing this in the usa? Clearwire is definitely the largest and most financially back WiMAX provider, but it's hardly the only WiMAX provider in the USA. There's a whole bunch including: DigitalBridge, Open Range, Towerstream, Nth Air, Xanadoo, and a number of others, including, interestingly enough, AT&T-subsidiary AT&T Alascom serving Alaska. Could it be because WiMAX is cheaper than HSPA? And is deployable now, whereas LTE isn't?
'»en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_de···networks'
'»www.wimaxmaps.org/'
why is everyone partnering with them? why not have other carriers start their own up?
As ISurfTooMuch said, "partnering with another company is cheaper and quicker."
It should be noted that cablecos: Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Bright House are significant equity partners in the "new" Clearwire, having invested $1.05 Billion, $550 million, and $100 million respectively. They have the right to operate as an Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) on Clearwire's network on a wholesale basis. Clearly, they intend to use this as their wireless play. This is a relatively cheap way to get into the national wireless game, which has enormous barriers to entry now.
Cox is taking a different route: deploying a CDMA/EvDO network its AWS spectrum, roaming on Sprint's 3G network, and deploying LTE in its 700 MHz spectrum. Clearly this is a more costly, difficult, and risky proposition, but they feel its worth it to own that pipe to their customers.
heck if comcast put a wimax tower at every head end, that would be a start... maybe verizon have one at every CO...
5 MHz of Clearwire's spectrum is reserved for WiMAX femtocells. Comcast has said they intend to eventually deploy a lot of them, possibly by having them integrated in cable modems and set top boxes (STBs).
Cablecos definitely need to provide more (fiber) backhaul to Clearwire. Unfortunately, I've heard almost nothing on that front. | |
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| Comcast *could* have a company like Cisco integrate femtocells into wireless router/gateways or cable modems (Cisco supplies both to Comcast today, through their Linksys and Scientific Atlanta subsidiaries). Problem: Cisco's Linksys subsid has a deal with Vonage. (Can you say *noncompete clause*? Cisco is also in the VoIP business itself, albeit enterprise-level VoIP, it isa deals like the one with Vonage that are *all* about keeping Cisco out of consumer VoIP.)
Comcast owns a lot of fiber; however, some of it is not wholly Comcast-owned (such as the joint expansion with Level 3). Both Comcast and TWC are customers of Level 3 (which also has a backhaul-supplier deal itself with Clear). The buildout is taking a while because there are some *physical* operations that have to be done (whether by the cablecos or Clear), and permitting chews up time. | |
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