Major infrastucture supplier calls it: LTE over WiMAX
If you're Clearwire or Sprint right now, the last thing you want to hear is one of the world's major suppliers of wireless infrastructure badmouthing the very technology that underpins your next-gen network -- so we imagine there's some groaning in the hallways and boardrooms of the world's WiMAX carriers today. Why? Alcatel-Lucent's COO of its wireless business, Patrick Plas, has pulled no punches in a statement this week that the firm is "not putting a lot of effort into [WiMAX] any longer" after noticing that there's "a clear direction taken by the industry towards LTE." Of course, it doesn't take an analyst to notice that Europe, Asia, and virtually every carrier in the Americas have all taken on a decidedly pro-LTE slant in the past couple years, and these guys are just following the money -- which in turn makes it harder (and more expensive) for the handful of WiMAX proponents with deployed networks to build out and stay technologically current. In the race to actual 4G commercialization, LTE's still got a ton of catching-up to do -- but once it does, it's looking poised to blow past WiMAX pretty quickly here. In the meantime, we'll be loving our Overdrives.
