WiMax in Australia: Part two
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Last week we heard how WiMax could be the standard that drives the next phase of mobile broadband. It provides an opportunity for players wanting to establish a pure IP network to carry voice and data effectively. The question is: is this what operators want?
In this second part of the story we discover how incumbent telcos are favouring the competing LTE standard. Even then, they still want voice to be carried across their legacy 3G networks. With the hype around LTE it sounds more and more unlikely that WiMax will have a big part to play in Australia's telecommunications future. It's not surprising then that Channel 7 has not been forthcoming with news about how the network will use its WiMax spectrum. Perhaps Channel 7 has given up on the idea.
There is another future for WiMax — one that could have scary implications for the future of mankind. Listen to the end of this week's episode for a prediction of the future. Be prepared!
To help get to the bottom of the future of WiMax, Phil Dobbie spoke to:
- Simon Hackett, managing director of Internode
- Hugh Bradlow, chief technology officer at Telstra
- Leighton Phillips, Intel manager (South East Asia & Australia) of Telecom Regulation and Policy
- Bill Rojas, research director for Asia-Pacific Communications Research at IDC Hong Kong
- Garth Freeman, former head of WiMax provider Buzz Broadband
- Deanna Weir, corporate development director at Austar
Listen to part one of the WiMax in Australia story in case you missed it, and be sure to leave your thoughts in the talkback below.