Ribbon beam amplifiers could lower the cost of wireless transmissions

And who doesn't want that? Bring it on, we say. At least, MIT certainly thinks they're kick-starting the second wireless revolution with their new ribbon beam amplifiers that promise to kick the bloomin' arses of the solid-state amplifiers currently in use in wireless base stations. Apparently, the things are smaller, more efficient, require smaller backup batteries, generate less heat, cost thousands of dollars less than their solid-state counterparts and can do a mean cha-cha to top it all off. If all goes according to plan, they could both improve throughput as well as reduce base station cost by 65 percent, saving wireless carriers billions of dollars as they roll out new infrastructure. These things could potentially lower the cost of delivering voice and data from the current 50 cents per megabyte to about five cents — all of which, we're quite sure, would be passed right along to the consumer.
Schyeah!

[Via Smartmobs]