Clearwire gets $900 million boost from Intel and Motorola

Intel and Motorola have decided to put their money where Craig O. McCaw's mouth is by investing $900 million dollars in his company, Clearwire, the WiMax provider that lost $140 million last year. Intel, having already made a smaller investment in the company back in 2004, is coughing up another $600 million cash, which sounds like a good indicator to us that their Centrino chips with WiMax are on the right development track. Motorola's smaller, but still substantial, $300 million dollar investment includes the purchase of NextNet, a Clearwire hardware subsidiary. All three companies are hoping that this deal brings us all one step closer to keeping us wired -- wirelessly of course -- no matter where we go, and that sounds good to us. As long as they can do it without making us all incredibly sick.

[GhostDoggy @ Jul 6th 2006 10:16AM]

I'm curious about latency. If latency is remarkably low and someone uses VoIP, are they exempt from the newly-mandated USF charges on VoIP for associated telephone line support for rural America?

[1334 @ Jul 6th 2006 11:59AM]

time to line the house with brass mesh...

[Bram @ Jul 6th 2006 12:43PM]

Didn't sweden just have to shut down their WiMax towers, because of people getting sick and passing out, hours after the towers went live?

is this safe yet? 900 million pigs is alot to throw at something that we "might" be able to use.

[Steven @ Jul 6th 2006 1:33PM]

Funny enoug I have clearwire. and omfg they suck. Latency is freaking awsome. I can play ut2k4 with no problems whatso ever. the service itself suks. there Terms of Service is the worst i have ever seen in my life.

[decypher @ Jul 6th 2006 3:56PM]

I had a one year contract with clearwire. I had to keep up with my end of contract date so that their 'evergreen' clause would not renew my year of horrible internet service. The slowest dial-up sevice that I have used is faster, much more reliable and 95% cheaper. Wireless? I was chained to a contract, a piece of hardware that was on a lease and I could not cancel without a $ penalty. I could not get my hardware back to them for a cancellation of services soon enough. I am now a much happier person with clearwire in my past.

[NSKGTI @ Jul 6th 2006 5:03PM]

It is funny to me how some people complain about Clearwire service or their T&C's. From my experience the service was very fast for web usage and basic stuff. Sure if you want to sit and download massive files or use VoIP stuff, you MIGHT find a better fit elsewhere, but in general I think their product is awesome.

In response to decypher's complaint about the leased hardware... Why would you buy hardware when they are moving to the certified WiMax devices as soon as it is available? $900M is a nice investment and if they hit the $1.4B they are looking for in the IPO they should become a national force as an ISP. With McCaw's vision about the industry, I see Clearwire being here for quite a while...

[blargman @ Jul 7th 2006 7:02AM]

wimax needs to die a slow and horrible death. Just another case of a huge corporation throwing money at an already outmoded technology.

3g and other technologies http://www.locustworld.com are much better solutions.

Sweden should keep their towers off. Wimax sucks

[tim lopez @ Jul 7th 2006 7:36PM]

might I direct you to my clearwire fan site.

http://www.clearwiresucks.com

just a forum

[Jesse @ Jul 8th 2006 9:00PM]

Im not even sure why were making such a hard push for WiMax.

3g and soon to be 4g will greatly outdo wimax, Its much more sensible to install large amounts of 4G networks. Most cellular phones now come standard with 3g support. And were seeing a lot of new laptops with internal 3g support as well as most laptops having support for 3g with wireless network access cards. Wimax stands no chance. In order to make the switch, we would need new hardware, and we would be in demand for wimax capable cell phones.

We already have 3g, well soon have 4g, Why make something else?

[Marcus @ Jul 13th 2006 12:05PM]

Doesn't anyone give a damn that these towers are making people sick somehow? Course not why would Intel worry about a minor detail like that.

[Franklin L Johnson @ Jul 18th 2006 2:11PM]

I love to read how stupid some people think we are. slower than cable? an out and out lie, and the person saying it is an idiot. for personal use clearwire is great and reasonable and Fast bozo. sorry folks i hate people with an agenda.
later

[swindled @ Jan 21st 2008 8:03AM]

Its great for the people that use Clearwire for browsing the internet and are happy with that...but what about the people that were lied to and conned? (I was told that by a sales rep... Clearwire is really fast...you can play games on it, you can download on it... I cant even watch Youtube) Just look at the ammount of people that are complaining about Clearwire. Look at all the things they are saying. I've had their service for about a month and I want to shoot myself. I think those of you backing Clearwire need to google Clearwire reviews and see what the majority of people are saying about it. Just because we dont want others to have to suffer the same fate doesn't mean we have an agenda. Do some research before you voice an ignorant opinion and flame people you don't even know.

[norma @ Sep 19th 2007 7:56AM]

Clearwire is the WORST service I have ever had for online access. Not only was it much SLOWER that verizon but they charge more and charge you to cancel even when you are unhappy with them. I would NEVER recommend them to anyone. Ran far far away!