October 1, 2008
12:20 PM -- At Light Reading's Backhaul Strategies for Mobile Operators event in New York last week, Clearwire LLC (Nasdaq: CLWR) chief technology officer John Saw discussed his Ethernet microwave-based backhaul approach for WiMax and ended up issuing a technology manifesto to microwave vendors. Here's what Saw wants for microwave backhaul:
Shorter installation times: Saw said more "out-of-the-box" thinking is needed on how long it takes to align antennas in point-to-point microwave.
Quality-of-service: He said it was "inexcusable" not to have quality-of-service in microwave today in the 21st century.
Higher bandwidth radios: The market needs a Gigabit Ethernet interface supported in a single radio and not packaged together in two radios, he said. This is because Clearwire sometimes can't fit two radios onto a tower.
Lower costs: If microwave is to become more competitive with fiber, then the equipment needs to be cheaper, said Saw.
Millimeter wave technology: Equipment vendors need to invest more in this technology development.
Clearwire's microwave backhaul vendors are DragonWave Inc. (AIM/Toronto: DWI; Nasdaq: DRWI), Orthogon Systems , and Redline Communications Inc. (See Clearwire's Backhaul Bet.)
— Michelle Donegan, European Editor, Unstrung
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