It has been an exciting few months for the WiMAX technology. After all the fancy talk and scores of papers theorising its efficacy and advantages, the technology is indeed getting rolled out in countries like South Korea.

But competing with other emerging technologies is going to be a big challenge for WiMAX.

Roger Nichols, Marketing Manager, Mobile Broadband Division, Agilent Technologies, the company that has evolved an eco-system to test WiMAX and other wireless technologies, said with enhancements like MIMO (maximum input and maximum output) WiMAX is ready to live up to its promise.

However, he agrees that it faces a stiff challenge from a group of technologies called 3.9-G; such as 3GPP, 3GPP2, LTE etc. These are called 3.9-G, as they are not part of the original IMT-2000 standards, like 3-G.

“With things like smart antennas, WiMAX’s ability to process data such as video and multimedia has considerably improved. In the next few months we are going to see a lot more devices in the market. But truly, the success of any technology depends not just on the efficiency of the technology per se, but also on the way it is commercialised,” Mr Nichols, who was in Bangalore to showcase some of Agilent’s testing devices for wireless technology, said.

As part of bodies like WiMAX forum and Fixed-Mobile Convergence Alliance, Agilent has not only been evolving testing systems for the wireless technologies, but are also part of the process to determine the direction of its progress. Mr Nichols explained exactly where the technology is heading to: “Unifying fixed and mobile connectivity (IEEE 802.16E) is surely an important objective of the newly emerging technologies.”

“We are trying to create a system where someone can sit and operate the Internet in a café and, while moving outside, can transfer the connectivity from the computer to their mobile device. The key here is to offer users a system that is always-best-connected, low latency and high QOS (Quality Of Service).”

Keeping the Internet connectivity up on a moving vehicle (referred to as High-mobility) is also something the wireless technology is trying to address. Easeful access inside vehicles moving up to 100 Kms/Hr is said to be a particular challenge (these are some of the enhancements envisaged in IMT-advanced, which, though not exactly a standardisation, has forseen how wireless networks would expand both in terms of capabilities and usage beyond 2010).

Though seamless transfer of data from one network to another has been spoken about for ages, Mr Nichols admits it turned out to be more complex in reality, a reason why it has taken long for the deployment. “If you ask me how close we are to seamless transfer of data, I would say that we are more or less there.

But, it would take some more time for these technologies to become common placed. Also, to say that these things work is one thing, but building compelling applications over them is quite another. I think we need to make progress on that front as well,” Mr Nichols said.

He said while mobile WiMAX has made progressed towards deployment, following HSDPA and 3GPP; the migration path leading to LTE may be a bit longer at this stage. As far the suitability, Mr Nichols said that would depend on the kind of services and requirements of the prospective users of these technologies.

“Moreover, getting spectral allocation remains a contentious issue, especially in a country like India, where proponents of the technology and service providers will have to work hard to convince authorities of the relative merits of their technologies. Though this alone won’t make a technology popular, I am sure this plays an important role,” Mr Nichols explained.

In India, Agilent is conducting training programmes with a view to familiarising people who work in telecom and wireless realm. “This includes people from government agencies. Of course, the aim here is to make them understand what these technologies stand for and enable them to take informed decisions over crucial issues,” said Mr Naresh Kumar, General Manager, Application Engineering Organisation, Agilent.

Agilent delivers the broadest test solution coverage – covering R&D, Validation, Manufacturing as well as Deployment of wireless systems and devices. 

 “In reality, be it LTE, 3-G or WiMAX, we would ensure all the users of these technologies have devices that work to the specification and produces the desired result. Therefore, it is imperative that we should keep moving with technology and make designs into devices and standards into systems,” Mr Nichols said.