The global BWA/WiMAX subscriber base increased by 260,246 in the first quarter of 2008, reaching a total of 1,988,246 subscribers according to figures from Maravedis.

“Even with an increase of more than 19% in WiMAX subscribers in the first quarter of 2008, operators are still waiting for the tipping point that will lead to acceleration of WiMAX adoption and deployments,” said Adlane Fellah, CEO and founder of Maravedis. “The key factors mainly centre on certification of mobile WiMAX equipment, a reduction in CPE pricing and the emergence of a device ecosystem.”

“Many operators have held back their network expansion pending the mobile WiMAX 802.16e equipment certification, which was announced in June 2008. Mobile WiMAX is a key enabler of a wider range of value-added services and product flexibility.” added Cintia Garza, co-author of the WiMAXCounts Quarterly Report.

“Of the 264 operators tracked in WiMAXCounts, approximately 50% of them are providing HIS (High Speed Internet) services only. The remaining percentage corresponds to operators that are offering different applications, such as VoIP, Video, VPN , in addition to HIS. We expect however double/triple play to become the norm in the next two years” said Robert Syputa, Maravedis Partner and Senior Analyst.

This Quarter's Key Findings:

65% of Operators are already commercial, 14% are trialing, 9% are planning their launch, 10% have idle spectrum and 2% have returned/lost spectrum.
Clearwire USA remains the top operator in number of subscribers, with an estimated 443,000 subscribers in the United States at the end of Q1 2008, an increase of 12.5% compared to the 394,000 subscribers reported in Q4 2007.

The split by subscriber type among WiMAXCounts operators was 65% residential and 35% business.

The 3.3–3.8 GHz band is the most widely deployed, with 63% of WiMAXCounts operators deploying their WiMAX networks in this band in Q1 2008, compared to 70% of the Operators deploying in this band during Q4 2007.

Q1 2008 BWA/WiMAX service revenue among WiMAXCounts operators totaled US$ 366 million, as compared to $US 303.65 million during the previous quarter, an increase of 20%.

Q1 2008 recorded ARPU was US$ 48 and US$ 146 for residential and business subscribers.

Motorola remains the leader in equipment deployed for both BWA/WiMAX CPEs

Source:cellular-news