WiMAX Getting Real, but What About 802.20? : "WiMAX Getting Real, but What About 802.20? "

Oyster Bay, NY - January 24, 2006 - With the recent announcement from the WiMAX Forum that some companies' equipment has successfully passed the "first wave" of WiMAX certification for 802.16-2004, WiMAX is finally starting to get real. Aperto Networks' PacketMAX 5000 base station, Redline Communications' RedMAX AN-100U base station, SEQUANS Communications' SQN2010 SoC base station solution, and Wavesat's miniMAX customer premise equipment (CPE) solution are all now certified as "first wave" approved. "This is a major milestone," according to ABI Research's senior analyst of wireless connectivity research, Philip Solis. "There is a long queue of companies waiting to undergo the same certification process. Then, they can proceed to ‘wave 2', covering security and quality-of-service, and when they too are certified, we can expect to see larger numbers of products actually reaching the market."At that stage the market will begin to widen, and we will start to see real interest from wireless ISPs in deploying certified fixed WiMAX solutions, rather than the proprietary systems that have been available for some time. In fact several initial deployments of pre-WiMAX networks are under way across the globe, including a growing number from Latin America. The picture is complicated, however, by a resurgence of rival wireless broadband access technology 802.20, based on frequency-division duplex technology developed by Flarion. "With the closing last week of Qualcomm's acquisition of Flarion, 802.20 may get a new lease on life," notes Solis. "Qualcomm will almost certainly attempt to rally support from other industry participants, but many companies had abandoned 802.20 to support 802.16e ."These and other market developments are covered in depth by ABI Research's study "WiMAX Semiconductors" which describes WiMAX chipset vendor strategies, architectures for RF and baseband, power consumption, ASPs, chipset availability, roadmap, and total WiMAX BOM cost. It forms part of the company's subscription "Wireless Semiconductors Research Service".Another report, "WiMAX: The Market for 802.16-2004 and 802.16e" examines the important drivers and inhibitors of this market; it explains mobile broadband technologies, and how the WiMAX market will evolve. It is available in the firm's "Wireless Infrastructure Research Service." Both Services offer a mix of research studies, "ABI Insights", databases, regular market updates and analyst inquiry time.Founded in 1990 and headquartered in New York, ABI Research maintains global operations supporting annual research programs, intelligence services and market reports in automotive, wireless, semiconductors, broadband, and energy. For information visit www.abiresearch.com, or call +1.516.624.2500.