The roll-out of high-speed WiMax broadband services is being kept artificially low by regulatory issues.
This is according to Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx, who was today commenting on a new survey on the impact WiMax technology has had in SA.
Goldstuck says delays in the awarding of licences to businesses and consumers for WiMax "has resulted in dampening of its potential impact".
"Although WiMax trial licences had been issued to a number of operators more than a year ago, and these licences had officially expired in January this year, the trial networks were being allowed to continue operating in pilot status until full licences are awarded," says Goldstuck.
He says this means commercial services still cannot be offered by these licence-holders.
Meanwhile, those companies that have been taking up WiMax product offerings have all been using a scaled-down Telkom version of WiMax, which is provided only where the fixed-line operators can't install ADSL lines.
"WiMax can theoretically offer speeds of up to 70Mbps, as opposed to ADSL's fastest option in SA of 4Mbps," says Goldstuck. "Even at far lower speeds, however, the potential offered by WiMax is not yet on the horizon, since no serious competition exists to spur its roll-out."
The WiMax in SA 2008 study reveals that only 8% of corporations had adopted WiMax options as part of their connectivity mix in 2007. However, they did not use WiMax as a preferred or only form of connectivity, but deployed it where no other options were available, such as in rural areas or areas with rough terrain that made fixed-line connectivity impossible or uneconomical.
Goldstuck's projections for 2008 indicate a significant increase in WiMax deployment, with 20% of corporations deploying it as an element of their connectivity solutions.
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