Wireless services: The race is not about speed but reach

Bridging the last mile broadband connectivity gap seems to be the latest craze among Indian telcos. No one, not especially the giants of the the likes which include Bharti, Vodafone, Reliance Communications (RCom) and Tatas, wants to be left behind. They want to try their hands on every technology they can afford to.

Gone are the days of dial-up connections, where one used to get an Internet connectivity speed of up-to 56 Kbps, that too over a wireline. Today one talks of megabits over kilobits, and that too over wireless connection, for data, voice and text.

Also Read: WiMAX: The wireless Broadband

Be it LTE (Long Term Evolution), WiMAX (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access), 3G (Third Generation)or WiFi (Wireless Fidelity), the wireless future of India shines bright.

On one hand, where the second generation of communication technology, 2G/2.5G, is set to give way for the third generation (3G). On the other, 4G technologies, such as LTE (the surprise factor of the BWA spectrum) and WiMAX, have also booked themselves a berth in India's race for wireless networks. Not to be left behind is WiFi, one of the longest serving wireless technologies in India today.

Theoretically, WiFi (IEEE 802.11g) can transmit up to 54 megabits per second (Mbps), whereas, WiMAX ((IEEE 802.16e) can provide a speed of up to 70 megabits per second. Coming to LTE, it will be more and and 3G will speed of up to 3 Mbps.

Considering the advanced versions of these technologies, Wireless N ((IEEE 802.11n) of WiFi, which will be rolled out this year, is said to give a speed of 300 Mbps, whereas, WiMAX 2.0, (IEEE 802.16m) will provide a throughput of over 350+ Mbps. Now coming to LTE (Rel 10 and Advanced) they are said to give much more speed than its predecessor.

So, among these technology siblings, who will win the race?

Sudarshan Boosupalli, country head, Ruckus Wireless, notes: “All technologies will co-exist. Today, the question is not about speed, but who will reach the market first and how affordable will their technology be for masses.”