WiMax is Coming Soon!

WiMax is the acronym for IEEE Standard 802.16. It is a wireless product designed to use the 10-to-66-GHz frequency bands. For this reason, its antenas require line-of-sight with other antennas. So it is a product used to interconnect buildings and towers rather than for indoor-type applications. It can, however, interconnect buildings and towers at very long ranges (up to 31 miles), potentially assisting in breaking the “digital divide” between city and rural areas. It is now being deployed, for example, in the country of Georgia.

WiMax is funded by some big players: Intel, Nokia and Fujitsu, who have set up a website to promote the standard. One article notes that Intel is pushing the technology heavily, and that Intel believes that “it will rapidly progress to indoor antenna installations.” Doubtful, unless I am missing something, because such high frequency applications do not work well indoors (so this reads like hype to me). In a more realistic scenario, the technology can be used as an inexpensive way to connect homes, although again, such sound like hype because of the practical considerations of building hundreds of “access points” that must have line of sight to each home. In any event, expect to see lots of news releases on this product in the coming months! WiMax has a place–outdoor interconnections–a market that has historically done horribly. Hopefully the promotion of a new standard will change that.