Displaying items by tag: WiMax

Samsung has announced a breakthrough in cellular technology that should help us get to 1Gbps on a cellular network by 2020. The new network is, of course, going to be called 5G and represents a huge improvement over current data transmission rates. What is interesting about the announcement is that we are now seeing a similar technology available in the form of 802.11ac for the home. Does Samsung’s break through show how cellular and traditional wireless have become the same technology?

Recently there was an announcement that Intel is pulling out of WiMax in Taiwan.  Now, this is pretty big news as Intel was one of the major proponents of WiMax and was in alliance with more than a few companies to see this project to its completion. The Taiwanese are not happy about this and are now there are rumblings that they are thinking of heading over to ARM to help them complete what they started. But those are just rumors at this stage of the game. After all Intel has not said they will not live up to their side of the deal ($500 Million towards building a WiMax network) they have only closed their offices in Taiwan. There are, however, indications that they are indeed getting ready to drop WiMax. Less than a month ago they released Clearwire from their exclusivity agreement. This agreement would have kept Clearwire tethered to WiMax until 2011. This is good news really as it now allows Clearwire (the provider of 4G service to Sprint in the US) to look into other options for rolling out their 4G service.
But why would Intel do this? The answer is an easy one; the recent settlement with the FTC. In fact if you look back at this one the writing has been on the wall for some time.