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BANGALORE, INDIA: Has India's wait for WiMAX been answered already? If going by reports, India already has WiMAX services in the market..
State-owned players BSNL and MTNL got spectrum prior to the WiMAX auction. However, has BSNL launched WiMAX in India? (BSNL claims to have launched WiMAX in four states - Goa, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra)
Not to be left behind are private players, such as Tata Teleservices, Reliance Communications, Sify and You Telecom, who have also put forth claims that they too have launched WiMAX.
However, the million dollar question that looms large over the Indian telecom scenario is whether or not India has any WiMAX service. Read More here: WiMAX: Go Unwired
Tata Indicom WiMAX or Broaband? Mehul Kapadia, head, marketing, Tata Communications Internet Services Ltd , says: "We have launched enterprise WiMAX in 150 cities. In Retail we have over 90 cities already live with WiMAX and have close to 50,000 customers on WiMAX in these cities."
According to Kapadia, depending upon the requirement, Tata Comm is able to offer speeds of up to 2 Mbps.
"Tata Indicom offers WiMAX service on IEEE 802.16d standard, which is fixed in nature. We currently have a fixed WiMAX deployment in the 3.3 band. We have the spectrum to offer this service. For 802.16d service, which can allow WiMAX customers roaming facility, we require spectrum."
According to him, there are multiple frequency bands like 2.3 / 2.5 /3.3 / 3.5, which have been defined as the standard spectrum bands by WiMAX Forum.
"In India, the auction is going to happen for 2.3 and 2.5 bands. We intend to participate in the spectrum auction as and when they come up. As per TRAI, speed of 256kbs and above only can be classified as broadband. We have a range of WiMAX plans from 256 kbps to 2 Mbps," Kapadia adds.
India yet to get first WiMAX service: Rao
According to C S Rao, chairman, WiMax Forum (India Chapter), says, there are no WiMAX services in the country as of now. "What BSNL, TTSL, Reliance Communications or others have launched is not WiMAX," he says.
"WiMAX is IEEE 802.16e protocol standard that operates in 2.3GHz and 2.5 GHz spectrum on TDD mode of operation. 3.3 GHz, is not a WiMAX Forum certified frequency band and IEEE 802.16 d, is an old technology that has been superseded by 802.16e for almost three years now. 16d is has got some principles of WiMAX, but it does not comply to the WIMAX Forum standard; 'd is dead'," notes Rao.
"We are waiting for the India Government to announce the spectrum auction for 2.3 and 2.5 GHz or a 10MHz plan on TDD, only then it will be successful."
Since this technology has got good potential, everybody is trying out a little variant of this technology quite fast, he says.
"So even before the auction if some operators are doing something like this, it only points out that it has got potential and only then they are taking it up. So it is a really positive thing. However, as the WiMAX Forum chairman, I can't endorse it as WiMAX.
"BSNL is in alliance with Harris Stratex and has procured equipment worth 8.000 billion, for WiMAX, at 2.5 GHz, at TDD mode, in 802.16e. They will launch it in Kerala and Chandigarh for residential broadband or WiMAX for consumers sometime in October. That will be WiMAX."
So even before the launch of WiMAX, no one should assume that this technology is a failure in India
