The Wireless Wow Factor

As a barometer for what’s hot in the service provider realm, you can’t get much better than NXTComm, the annual event that defines the summer months for many companies (and reporters, for that matter). This year, there’s a fresh buzz around WiMAX and seamless mobility, perhaps indicating the continuing onslaught of convergence of network technologies and service provider categories. If news advances are any indicator, wireless will bring the “wow” factor to the show floor this year.

Take, for instance, WiMAX. Last year, the BWA technology was virtually nonexistent at the show. What a difference 12 months makes. At NXTComm we’ll see gear manufacturers, service providers, back-office companies and applications specialists showcasing their WiMAX wares, all a product of several healthy market factors, including the fact that:

* Sprint’s 4G mobile WiMAX network goes live next year.

* Towerstream Corp. has gone public (and plans to use NXTComm to let the world know it’s arrived).

* BT has shown interest in 802.16e.

* The FCC is creating a potentially excellent market for WiMAX in the United States by freeing up the 700MHz band and earlier this month announcing its decision to uphold its 2005 nonexclusive licensing scheme for the 3650MHz band spectrum, which could be used for WiMAX if the WiMAX Forum creates profiles for them.

Already, new entrants like MSV, a satellite provider, are evaluating 802.16e as a way to gain the quad play.

“WiMAX is an extremely strong market to watch,” said Regina Moldovan, senior manager of WiMAX marketing at Nortel Networks. “From new entrants and start-ups to 2G operators that want to leapfrog to 4G, it has a lot of applicability.”

Nortel will enhance its WiMAX ecosystem at the show, announcing a pre-integrated VoIP over WiMAX offer and highlighting its ongoing efforts to work with device manufacturers and chipset makers to create device availability and guarantee interoperability. “The intent is to bundle so we can deliver an end-to-end solution with devices, infrastructure and services,” said Moldovan. “The No. 1 application for WiMAX we’ve found is VoIP. So a big thrust of this is proving out VoIP over WiMAX works.”

Speaking of devices, attendees will get a first look at mobile WiMAX consumer electronics at the Nokia Siemens Networks booth, which will be linchpins to uptake for the mobile WiMAX service; the Nokia N770 Internet tablet on view will be WiMAX-enabled and launched in 2008. Also, be on the lookout for various demos of 4G; for example, Alcatel-Lucent will be holding a live interactive conference over WiMAX in which a person outside the convention center using a WiMAX-enabled tablet PC will move between two adjacent WiMAX base stations on board a Segway Transporter vehicle, while the VoIP/video session remains “live.” Meanwhile, Veraz Networks, a media gateway vendor, also will be showcasing its ability to support WiMAX deployments.

With live applications come management requirements, a sure sign of a maturing market. Swedish company Tailf will showcase its ConfD network management software, which both telecom equipment providers and WiMAX operators can leverage to streamline device configuration and management. And Tektronix will unveil solutions for WiMAX protocol testing and monitoring.

For further market and product trend information on WiMAX, NXTComm attendees this year can attend the new colocated WiMAX Strategies conference staged by Trendsmedia.

While WiMAX will have a high profile, good old-fashioned cellular technologies will be a highlight of the show as well.

For example, Mirapoint and Nokia will announce an alliance at NXTcomm to extend e-mail and calendar features to the mobile workforce; Nokia Intellisync Mobile Suite for Mirapoint combines Nokia’s mobility infrastructure with Mirapoint’s secure messaging appliances. It will be a shot across the bow to Good Technology, Microsoft and others in the ongoing wireless e-mail applications showdown.

Meanwhile, Ericsson plans to make a splash at the show, using the event to kick off its North American strategy, which hinges on fixed-mobile convergence and seamless mobility. Recent acquisitions of Entrisphere, Marconi, Redback and Tandberg have given the vendor an integrated networking suite for FMC, or broadband access from any device or screen, anywhere, anytime. One demo, dubbed “HSPA Evolved,” will show Ericsson's new commercial HSPA base station with MIMO doubling the average downlink speed to 28mbps, making it suitable for efficient mobile television.

Alcatel-Lucent is launching a software platform that lets mobile operators capitalize on the increasing demand for mobile content shopping. The Alcatel-Lucent 5965 Mobile Content Platform lets operators create a personalized mobile shopping experience for targeted subscriber segments based on individual interests and behavior, and improve the overall quality of their service with expert content management, merchandizing and delivery of mobile advertising and entertainment.

To provide context, the vendor has unveiled new research this week from The Worldwide Lab at Alcatel-Lucent, a program designed to understand the preferences of teens and young adults. The latest results reveal a willingness to purchase mobile content and a desire for a more streamlined, simplified mobile content shopping experi-ence that mirrors other channels.

Some of the key findings: The current mobile content shopping experience is challenging for teens and young adults and inadequate when compared to similar services at the mall or on the computer; young mobile customers are used to having messages targeted at them and expressed significant interest in receiving targeted ads including unsubscribed, personalized advertising and awareness campaigns that deliver relevant content to their mobile devices; and subscribers continue to be surprised at the lack of visible, relevant brands on their mobiles. They want to be marketed to as they are on the Internet, at the mall and on TV. To further hone the point, the vendor demo will showcase a multiscreen consumer experience theme across the three screens – TV, mobile, PC. It will show how content can be shared across those screens whether users are at home or on the go – providing a simple, personal and predictable experience.

All that data traffic will drive an increased need for backhaul. Worldwide mobile cell site backhaul equipment grew 13 percent to $3.9 billion between 2005 and 2006, and is forecast to grow to $6 billion by 2010, largely driven by Ethernet. Ceragon will be talking about the choices wireless operators have for microwave and IP/Ethernet for backhaul, launching an advanced IP native/Ethernet offering at NXTcomm.

But the biggest wireless-oriented happening at the show could be new developments revealed during the keynote speech by AT&T Inc.’s brand-new chairman and CEO, Randall Stephenson. With AT&T’s continuing embrace of fixed-mobile convergence and wireless integration, the service provider is expected to make several an-nouncements in the wireless space.

Alcatel-Lucent www.alcatel-lucent.com
AT&T Inc. www.att.com
Ceragon www.ceragon.com
Ericsson www.ericsson.com
FCC www.fcc.gov
Nokia Siemens Networks www.nokiasiemensnetworks.com
Nortel Networks www.nortel.com
Mirapoint www.mirapoint.com
Tail-f Systems www.tail-f.com
Tektronix www.tek.com
Trendsmedia www.trendsmedia.com
Veraz Networks www.veraz.com

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