Rajala, I've been banging my head against the wall for some time on this WLL concept, too. I suppose I just don't get it either.
What seems obvious to me (so it has a slightly better than even chance of being correct!) is that it costs less to build wireless infrastructure than landline, assuming you are starting essentially from scratch and all other things being equal, which they're usually not quite. No worries about trenching wire, digging up streets, right of way -- all that messy last ten miles stuff. This is the basic concept that made me interested in investing in Qualcomm, Globalstar, etc.
What is less obvious to me is that there would be any significant cost advantage in manufacturing and installing a WLL system instead of a standard issue CDMA cellular/PCS system covering the same geography. Is WLL more spectrum efficient? Are royalties, taxes, or other costs that much different?
I don't know, but my guess is that similarly featured WLL phones and CDMA (even GSM!) phones are not going to cost that much different to manufacture once they get to the point of making millions per year of each. The service, of course, will cost exactly as much as the market will pay, which will vary depending on lots of different factors, but I would be surprised if there would be all that much intrinsic difference between the two.
The question then is why someone would pay $X.00 for WLL and not pay $X.00 or even $X.10 for CDMA?
Of course, what I really think is that everyone should be putting in their orders for Globalstar phones today! So you can see what I know! |
