As Advertised (But NOT As Advertised)

 
I just returned from India, where we have a few customer and partner deals brewing.

The Indian market is playing out as advertised. All of Altair’s assumptions have, in essence, been validated by this trip.

Let me explain:

As you know, there was a major debate regarding the BWA spectrum auctions in India. Who would win? How many players would there be at the end of the day? And, our primary interest, would the winners be WiMAX- or LTE-focused in their deployment strategies?

Of course, as I wrote several weeks ago, LTE was the big winner of those auctions, thanks in large part to the delay in conducting them, and, as a result, LTE making up ground on the technology lead that WiMAX had a year earlier.

So we weren’t surprised when we heard explicitly from executives at some of the auction-winning carriers that they have been frustrated by the FUD being put forth by some in the WiMAX-oriented community.

Now, normally FUD is just part of the game. I know my competitors are always going to outline the (potential) downside of my product. But this is different.

What I learned during this visit is that the Indian market has moved beyond the FUD stage concerning LTE vs. WiMAX. The decision has been made and the market has selected LTE – and this is what I heard first-hand from executives of Indian carriers.

And those who are promoting the WiMAX – to – LTE transition nonsense are not only sounding ignorant, they are also doing a disservice to the industry.

These carriers have quite a realistic understanding of where the two technologies are, and they don’t buy the argument that “WiMAX today and LTE tomorrow” makes sense.

Because it doesn’t.

By the time live handoffs between WiMAX and LTE-based devices will work, WiMAX will have been irrelevant for these potential carriers that will supposedly have deployed both.

A clear, graceful migration path from WiMAX to LTE doesn’t exist.

The motivation to do so is questionable at best, and diminishes further in every day that passes.

And the carriers already understand this.

During my recent visit to India, I learned that several carriers will initiate LTE deployments this year; some will do trials this year and deploy LTE in 2011.

But more importantly, I learned that the Indian market is playing out as advertised … but NOT as some are advertising.
 

- Eran Eshed