Tech battle

New Delhi, April 4 (PTI): The amount of spectrum up for sale in the forthcoming broadband wireless access, or WiMax, auction next week is inadequate, according to an expert.

“It is commonly known in the industry that WiMax requires minimum 30 MHz of spectrum, whereas India is offering only 20 MHz and this may result in severe interference problems,” Haken Eriksson, chief technology officer of Swedish telecom equipment firm Ericsson, said.

Along with the WiMax auction, leading operators are also warming up for the spectrum auction of 3G mobile telephony. The 3G auctions are due on Friday to be followed by the WiMax sale.

However, a forum of WiMax operators are claiming that their technology is superior to 3G as it can offer much higher broadband speed of up to 30 megabytes per second (Mbps) compared with just 14 Mbps in case of 3G technology.

However, Eriksson considers long term evolution technology (4G) — an upgraded version of 3G — as a better alternative to WiMax.

Analysts said WiMax and 4G were similar to an extent in the way they transmit data and in network speeds.

Asked about the availability of LTE, Eriksson said, “LTE as technology is already launched, and is just months away from large scale deployments.”

Telecom regulator Trai has already initiated discussions on LTE technology in India.

The government is auctioning two slots of 20 MHz each of WiMax spectrum, and an aggressive bidding is expected as 11 players will be up against each other to grab a slot.

According to Eriksson, LTE is a natural evolution of GSM and the CDMA standards, and the expected large global coverage enables easy inward and outward roaming.

“The situation will be similar to the existing difference between GSM and CDMA mobile operators, as WiMAX is estimated to reach a global market share of only one per cent,” he added.