LTE vs WiMAX

LTE and WiMAX continues to rage at least three years after it ignited. Late in 2007, Verizon and AT&T said they would adopt LTE, viewed as a competing technology to mobile WiMAX, as the underpinning of their 4G networks. Both carriers said LTE provides a more natural upgrade for their GSM/UMTS/HSPA/CDMA-based networks and subscribers.

Though many, except for Sprint and Clearwire, think it might already be over, with LTE the winner. Sprint and Clearwire turned up service in Baltimore in late 2008. As of May 2010, Clearwire has commercial WiMAX services available in 27 U.S. markets, covering more than 34 million points of presence. Clearwire is offering the service on a wholesale basis to Sprint, Comcast and Time Warner Cable. By the end of 2010, Clearwire will have built out a WiMAX network that spans all major U.S. markets and covers 120 million points of presences. 

Both wireless technologies are intended to offer ubiquitous broadband at multiple megabits per second. Mobile WiMAX is an IEEE specification also known as 802.16e and designed to support as high as 12Mbps data-transmission speeds. It uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access, which transmits data by splitting radio signals that are broadcast simultaneously over different frequencies. These signals are immune to interference and can support high data rates.

LTE was developed in the 3G Partnership Project as the natural progression of High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA), the GSM technology that is currently used by carriers such as AT&T to deliver 3G mobile broadband. LTE is a modulation technique that is designed to deliver 100Mbps per channel and give individual users performance comparable to today's wired broadband.