Plugfest moves Mobile WiMax toward interoperability, broad deployment
By Maury Wright, Editorial Director -- EDN, June 7, 2007
The mobile flavor of WiMax (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access) could be the keystone leading the wireless broadband technology to widespread deployment. Mobile WiMax supports true mobile broadband and will likely take over the fixed-location market, as well, due to economies of scale (see "WiMax gains in mobile-broadband game, but 4G lurks,"EDN, March 29, 2007, pg 56). To push interoperability among Mobile WiMax products, key players gathered in Sophia Antipolis, France, in mid-May for the third public Mobile WiMax PlugFest.
AT4 Wireless, a Málaga, Spain, services and testing company and the ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) hosted PlugFest. In attendance were a number of key semiconductor, communication-equipment, handset, software, and test-equipment vendors, including Alcatel-Lucent, Fujitsu, Intel, Motorola, PicoChip, Samsung, Agilent, Azimuth Systems, and Rohde & Schwarz.
PlugFest marked the first time that the WiMax Forum tested key mobility features, such as MIMO (multiple input/multiple output) and beam forming. Such technologies will be key to Mobile WiMax's realizing its range and performance goals. PlugFest also focused on session handover between two base stations.
