WiMAX technology plugged along toward its goal of a standard protocol, announcing demonstrations in Canada and the start of the certification process in Spain.
Application demos for Xbox wireless console gaming over WiMAX-to-WiMAX-based streaming media took place at the WiMAX Forum’s quarterly meeting in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Meanwhile in Malaga, Spain, the WiMAX Forum Certification test lab at Cetecom has opened and was testing some of the same equipment in use at the Canadian meeting. The first WiMAX Forum-certified interoperable products are expected to be available by November or December.
“We are excited by the opportunity to show off the capabilities of WiMAX technology in Vancouver and prove that WiMAX is real,” said Ron Resnick, president of the WiMAX Forum. “At the same time, the fact that much of the equipment running successfully in Canada is the same equipment going through certification in Spain is extremely encouraging and bodes well for the future of WiMAX and the advent of true personal broadband.”
More than 400 participants from WiMAX Forum member companies attended the event in Vancouver. Also at the forum, demonstrations from Nortel Networks Ltd., Microsoft Corp., The Walt Disney Co., Logitech, Cisco Systems Inc., AT&T Corp., AudioCodes, Kencast, Ixia and Skype ran on a variety of WiMAX technology vendor systems from companies including Alvarion, Proxim, Redline and Wavesat. The demos represent five key WiMAX application types: Voice over Internet Protocol, streaming media, interactive gaming, Web browsing and file transfer/media download.
Korea Telecom, an event supporter, spoke of its vision for wireless broadband service and mobile WiMAX, WiBRO, during a keynote speech. “KT is committed to the mobile future of WiMAX technology, not just in Korea, but all over the world,” said Dr. Hong, Won-Pyo of Korea Telecom’s Mobile Internet Business Group.
