Hi John,
Here is a post from Art, qcom thread about his opinion. Interesting.
John
Snip>>>>>>>
From: Art Bechhoefer 1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) of 60180
The Nokia/Intel decision to discontinue work on a HSPDA notebook suggest that both are now looking more toward an eventual switch to WiMAX as the preferred high speed data communication system. In Nokia's world, this would also mean expanding GSM services, mainly for voice. So you would have two separate systems, one for voice and one for data, neither of which would require QCOM patents.
That, of course, is the theory. In practice, it isn't so simple, clean, or well articulated. I don't believe that at this point WiMAX can be viewed as a general solution to high speed wireless data communications. And even if it does achieve the technological breakthroughs to be considered a general solution, WCDMA and CDMA2000 will already be well established standards, making it difficult to adopt a new system that has little, if any cost advantages.
There is a parallel here with competing video recording technologies that the industry faced in the 1980's. You may recall that VHS beat out Betamax (which gave a better quality picture initially) because VHS allowed much longer recording time on a single casette. Then Sony tried to get back into the competition with its 8mm casettes--smaller in size, but with quality equal to or exceeding VHS, and similar recording times. The 8mm technology never got wide acceptance and gradually faded from the market.
The competition between the established VHS and the "new" 8mm beta system introduced unsuccessfully by Sony has many analogies with CDMA2000/WCDMA and WiMAX. Unless WiMAX can show major cost advantages, I doubt that it will succeed, not only because of the cost issue but also because of the interference issue: Like Sprint, other WiMAX users will have to resort to spectrum different from that used by GSM/WCDMA and CDMA2000 to avoid interference in a given area.
Another example is the adoption of Windows over the Macintosh system. Even though the Mac came out first, the policy of Apple to refrain from licensing both its hardware and software, with the resulting high cost of its system, guaranteed that Windows, despite its shortcomings, would become the prevailing standard. Here cost clearly trumps performance. For WiMAX to prevail over CDMA2000 or WCDMA, there would have to be a substantial cost advantage. I just don't see this occurring.
Art <<<<snip |
