Year: 2009

Chicago, Motorola City, was supposed to receive WiMAX in 2008, but…, it just didn’t happen.

The Chicago Tribune reports:

The network already is in place, stretching from Gary to Rockford, but isn’t ready to go live.

What will qualify the network as ready to be live is not very clear, and currently it is expected:

It looks like late in 2009

There is further analysis why Baltimore happened before Chicago, but I have a feeling the main reason is not disclosed: Samsung Base Stations were deployed in Baltimore, while Motorola in Chicago.

A side note, the article also mentions Towerstream, a relatively small company with a very clear business plan, provide Broadband to businesses using probably “Fixed WiMAX” network. The company reports more than 100 customers in Chicago, and they recently claimed that has reached EBITDA profitability in this Chicago Market.

In a recent article, titled Motorola accelerates cutbacks and defends WiMAX Stand, Dan Molony president of the Home and Network Mobility unit claims:

“…the company will focus most of its activities on converged broadband and ‘4G’, and will carry out projects in all three of its chosen technology platforms during 2009. The strategy gains some credibility from the dominant position that Motorola has in the newly merged Clearwire operator, the world’s most ambitious WiMAX-based mobile broadband plan. The vendor has 25 commercial WiMAX systems running so far, in 20 countries, and has trials and other projects in 49 countries.”

These are good news for WiMAX, as a major vendor reaffirms commitment to Technology while disclosing some information regarding active deployment. Those are 25 commercial Mobile WiMAX systems.

Calcalist Business website (Hebrew) reveals that Runcom Technologies acquired another Israeli company, Bamboo Media Casting. This is the second acquisition Runcom made in the past two months (Runcom to invest in IXI).

According to Calcalist, the Bamboo acquisition is mostly of IP as most personnel was laid-off in the past few months. China Tel was supposed to acquire Bamboo a few months ago but backed off, now it is clear why.

In a very interesting move, Runcom Technologies is changing from a Technology (chipset) supplier to an Equipment Vendor and even an operator. As announced in November, China Tel and Runcom signed a “Strategic Framework Agreement” :

1) Runcom shall be the lead WiMAX equipment vendor for ChinaTel

2) Runcom shall invest USD $100,000,000 in ChinaTel for exchange for a %28.6 interest in ChinaTel

It is not disclosed where will Runcom get the money, but at least the path is clear. Runcom is going to deploy a major WiMAX network in China, and will use the recent acquired companies to complete the offering.