14 DAY TRIAL // A recently published report from Maravedis shows that the world's top 22 WiMAX operators are expected to account for around 2.5 million subscribers by the end of the ongoing year, more than double the 1.24 million today. At the same time, the number of their subscribers is expected to reach nearly 4 million by the end of 2010.
Among the other facts that the report points out we should mention that 47 percent of the currently existing networks only have less than 10,000 subscribers, while 75 percent of the operators have more than 10 million POP covered. The report also shows that carriers generate an average ARPU of $93 for business services, as well as $35 for residential services. 33 percent of the operators use microwave radios alone for their backhaul, while 52 percent have plans to roll out femtocells in the next 24 months.
The report talks about operators that are able to fulfill two key conditions, namely they have enough spectrum to make the deal profitable on long term, while also having the financial means to deploy WiMAX networks. According to the report, 46 percent of the operators have 50MHz or more of spectrum at their disposal, while 45 percent of them have more than $100 million in cash.
Among said carriers, there are popular names like Clearwire, as well as others that only account for a smaller number of subscribers, but which would have the potential to grow, says Maravedis, such as Scartel from Russia. The list also includes names like UQ Communications (Japan), Far EasTone (Taiwan), BSNL (India) and Telmex International.
A lot of operators are focused on how to be able to make new network deployments so as to be able to fulfill increased market demands for higher bandwidth, as well as for rich content. “A major focus of this report is to provide insights of the plans and experiences of the top 22 operators. At this volatile juncture, it is important to keep close tabs on evolution of network deployments and services,” said Adlane Fellah, CEO of Maravedis.
“Interestingly, 42% of these operators are considering or planning to deploy LTE,” said Cintia Garza, senior analyst and co-author of the report. “Networks have been dominated so far by standalone CPEs as well PC peripherals such as USB dongles and PC cards. Embedded multimode devices are only emerging in the last few months thanks to operators such as Scartel,” added Garza.
The worldwide economic downturn has affected the 22 top WiMAX carriers as well, although they are sustained by strong investor groups and have enough cash to offset limited credit facilities. During the ongoing year, Maravedis expects wireless capital expenditures from most of the top WiMAX operators to slow down. At the same time, some of them might also be constrained by the fact that they do not have enough spectrum to fulfill their deployment plans.
“It is important to keep in mind that WiMAX is just now entering a phase of commercial availability that makes volume applications, including machine to machine, utility monitoring, metro-wide mobile broadband and embedded consumer applications feasible. In addition, the lean WiMAX ecosystem has already reached price points for ICs, modules and devices to compete in volume markets,” noted Robert Syputa, partner & senior analyst.