Author: Avi Telyas

Not news, but I have encountered an article in Ars Technica – Future of WiMAX is Clear as Sprint, Clearwire close deal.

There is a word game in the title, as the new merged network will be named “Clear”, which sounds a bit strange too me:
“I have called “Clear” and bought their “Clear” CPE” – doesn’t sound right. Xohm was better!

The article also discusses spectrum allocation and competitors LTE plans.

In case you can’t read Hebrew, you may have missed the news that Alvarion mulls Layoffs.

This Globes article reports it in English,  but fails to mention that the number 10% was repeated in other websites.

Alvarion currently has more than 1000 employees around the world, most of them (around 80%) in Israel.

WiChorus received their Series C Funding of $18 Million, which brings the total investment in the Company to $43 million.

It is a reassuring step for WiMAX?

RedHerring report hints the opposite:
““Nobody can say for certain how bad or how long the downturn will be, but that is part of the reason why we sought a cushion just in case the economy impacts the [carrier] rollouts [of WiMAX],” said Renan Jalil, CEO of WiChorus.”

The report also keeps mentioning WiMAX, when WiChorus website is trying to rebrand themselves out of the WiMAX business, and into the 4G and LTE market as well.

A press release from Yesterday reports a successful First Ever Multi-Band mobile WiMAX Handover.

This was achieved using the MiMAX USB, a Quad band Mobile WiMAX USB dongle.

“Staged in the UK, this achievement was performed with the collaboration of long-term customer and partner FREEDOM4 and strategic partners Starent Networks, using their Access Service Network (ASN) gateway for connection management, and Bridgewater Systems, using their subscriber management solution that delivers carrier-grade authentication, authorization, and accounting (AAA) services.”.

I am very proud of this unique achievement, which can benefit operators:

“Carriers and operators will benefit from the option to deploy a single, large mobile WiMAX network using two or more frequency bands. In many regions, the availably of 2.5 GHz is limited. Now operators can aggregate spectrum to allow significant expansion of coverage and roaming capabilities. A carrier, for example, could begin with a small allocation at 2.3 or 2.5 GHz and add a larger, often more affordable, allocation at 3.X GHz or even 5 GHz.”

Disclaimer: I was one of the people who founded this project, and was the Software Manager of the MiMAX USB for more than 2 years