End-to-end WiMAX solution not lip service from Nortel

The director of wireless product marketing at Nortel Networks Corp. tells Report on Wireless the company's decision to brand its own end-user WiMAX devices isn't lip service to customers. "It's table stakes to offer devices with your infrastructure," says Danny Locklear. "But it is also a method of differentiation for Nortel in being able to bring chipsets and devices into our labs and into the early cycle of R&D such that we don't just lip service around an integrated solution, but an integrated solution that can offer differentiation around applications," he adds. The Toronto-based telecommunications equipment vendor announced at WiMAX World in Chicago a couple of weeks ago that it was expanding in the subscriber unit market to a much larger degree. Nortel's products will be based on the 802.16e 2005 Wave 2 certification standard which incorporates multiple input, multiple output (MIMO) antenna technology. The announcement marks not only the addition of a direct sales force for WiMAX-enabled devices, but an important step in offering an end-to-end value proposition for service provider customers. Nortel is gambling that next-generation wireless operators are going to want to get all their WiMAX gear, including networking equipment and subscriber units, from a single vendor. In a statement announcing the new strategy the company said that it would offer end-user devices such as PCMCIA cards, USB dongles, indoor routers and outdoor gateways. The decision to get into the subscriber unit market, according to Locklear, is the result of a large number of new service providers getting into the market that either have little experience or are expanding to offer a broader high-speed access portfolio, and they need both infrastructure and access equipment. "These service providers are looking for a one-stop shop," he says. "As the technology is initially introduced and the evolution of devices is still at play, they want to ensure there is a single integrator that can deliver them devices, infrastructure and applications that are already integrated and makes it easy for them to deploy and start generating revenue quickly." Despite the market still being at a nascent stage, Nortel had to make a move now if it was going to maximize potential for its devices strategy. Once Intel Inc. begins announcing notebooks with integrated Wi-Fi and WiMAX chipsets, any advantage Nortel and others with similar strategies have will quickly disappear. "We certainly believe that through 2008 and maybe into early 2009, there is definitely a need to ensure that you have an integrated solution...but as Intel starts embedding WiMAX-enabled chipsets in laptops, as consumer devices start using WiMAX, we think it will be less important at that time," Locklear explains. "But who knows? The market could maybe still demand tightly integrated solutions, but there's definitely a need early on as the market starts to spread."Additional Nortel rationale for expanding into this market can be found in the past failures of 3G. "There was so much focus around getting infrastructure out in the marketplace to support the promised capabilities of 3G UMTS, but there wasn't a common timing with a device that would enable the experience that had been promised to end users," explains Locklear. Another key ingredient of Nortel's new WiMAX strategy is the close integration of applications with both the network and devices. While it's still unclear what some of the more compelling WiMAX applications are going to be, Nortel singles out Voice over IP and video as two. "When we say an integrated solution, it's solutions that are optimized on applications that are going to be critical to this next-generation network such as Voice over IP and video," Locklear says. "Every one of our customers that we're working with today are looking for an end-to-end value proposition to include devices, which are a big part of their business."

End-to-end WiMAX solution not lip service from Nortel

News | October 9, 2007

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