WiMAX vs. LTE: A False Idea?

When it comes to 4G mobile broadband, WiMAX has a time to market advantage, but LTE has the support of most major wireless operators. Which will win the 4G shooting match? Which has the potential to be more disruptive?

It turns out, these are not the questions to ask.

“Though 4G might be disruptive, perhaps the better question is, what is it disruptive to?” said Martin Suter, vice president of business development at service provider Wi-Fi specialist BelAir Networks, during a session at the VON Conference & Expo. “There are ramifications for some of the other things that are going on in the industry, like net neutrality challenging the status quo. Those are some doors being broken down as a function of the mobile Internet.”

“Neither technology’s disruptive in and of itself, but the services it enables are,” said Fred Kemmerer, CTO for GENBAND. Video and content are happening right now and carriers need to deliver bandwidth efficiently. They need technologies like DPI and femtocells in order to make the business case work.”

As for which is more likely to be viable, on the surface it looks like there is indeed a smackdown of sorts happening. Suter said that out of 86 percent of mobile operators supporting GSM today, 0 percent of them will shift to WiMAX. Meanwhile, 100 percent of incumbents will end up with LTE, plus some CDMA operators like Verizon Wireless. Problems that WiMAX has a technology, Suter added, is the fact that it’s revolutionary not evolutionary technology, better suited for new builds. Meanwhile there’s a clear upgrade path for LTE. And, there’s no killer device, and there’s a lack of roaming to consider.

“But does this mean WiMAX is dead?” asked Suter. “I would suggest probably not.”

In the United States Clearwire Corp. is the poster child for WiMAX but recently the CEO has been hedging a bit, saying it would switch to LTE if warranted. But there are also 18 other WISPs across the country are deploying WiMAX; plenty of the broadbband stimulus might be leveraged by WiMAX operators, especially for M2M and smart grid applications. And according to the WiMAX Forum there are a full 455 networks worldwide (including 15 in Finland).

“I think both will find a place in the market, just different markets,” said Kemmerer. “It’s more about market factors as to how the market develops.”