Intel has always been a supporter and promoter of Wimax technologies the world over. So its no surprise to see Intel being interested in investing in Wimax technologies in India as well.
Mr Sriram Viswanathan, Vice-President, Intel Capital and General Manager, WiMAX Program Office had this to say when questioned on his India plans – “We are always looking for opportunities. We have invested a significant amount in many countries including US, Japan, Malaysia and Taiwan. We have done roughly a dozen plus operators. Our objective is to cover a billion people over the next few years with WiMAX technology and India with its huge population offers good opportunity,”
The only way Intel can invest into wimax is invest in Telecom Co’s that get Wimax spectrum alotted to them via the auction which is expected to be held in January 2009. Besides for state-owned telecom majors BSNL and MTNL, private players including Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices are expected to deploy WiMAX-based wireless broadband services in India by next year.
The major issue facing the growth of technologies like wimax and 3G is investments especially in the current slowdown scene where cash is hard to come by and lesser and lesser companies would take risk with new technologies. Intel has made investments the world over in application and equipment companies like Telsima, Beeceem and also NIIT, Sasken and Rediff.
But given the auction is just around the corner more such investments would need to be made for the growth and adoption of new technologies.
There is WIBro which samsung is promoting if Im not wrong. Its another for of wimax.. check wikipedia entry here -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WiBro