What if cellular data plans were not for devices but for the subscribers using them? And if multiple devices were allowed on the same plan? Could subscribers use more devices to connect and attach an higher value to their data plan?

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Some WiMAX operators have indicated their intention to move to LTE or their interest in transitioning to the new technology. A transition from WiMAX to LTE is possible, and in some cases it will be a straightforward and relatively inexpensive network upgrade, but in all cases it will require good planning from the operator. In this column published in FierceBroadbandWireless we discuss what it takes for WiMAX operators to move to LTE.

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I spend a lot of time talking to wireless operators and, in preparation for a webinar on Connected Planet sponsored by Motorola, I asked myself what are the features that makes a WISP successful. I do not think there is a single factor or a handful of them.

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The wireless industry has been undoubtedly pleased by the Obama endorsement of the FCC recommendation to make an additional 500 MHz of spectrum available for wireless broadband in the United States over the next ten years. Increased spectrum availability for wireless broadband is a top requirement to accommodate data traffic growth. According to Cisco's VNI index, data traffic will grow 16 times and video traffic 20 times by 2014 wireless broadband. The introduction of new wireless interfaces like HSPA+, WiMAX or LTE will bring some relief, but may be at best capable of accommodating half of the additional traffic due to increased spectrum efficiency.

However, to keep up with data demand and to avoid massive investment, operators in the U.S. and in most other countries will need to do more than roll out an LTE network in the spectrum they currently have. Infrastructure sharing is one of the tools that operators have to increase utilization of their spectrum assets, provide better coverage and throughput to their customers, and to reduce capex and opex.

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More than 90 million WiMAX subscribers worldwide, with 47% of them in Asia Pacific by 2014, generating $24 billion in service revenues. By 2014, 53% of subscribers will use WiMAX as a mobile technology, with 31% of subscribers using dongles, 7% embedded laptops, 27% phones or other devices.

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Is the signaling traffic from BlackBerries, iPhones, and Android smartphones creating just as much congestion in cellular networks as actual data traffic is? There is considerable disagreement among those that I talk to, and mobile operators are not too keen to share data–but it is a topic you are likely to hear more about in the future as the implications of signaling traffic in networks dominated by data traffic become better understood.

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I just finished an article on TD-LTE and how it will affect WiMAX, in the short term and in the long term. No longer a Chinese technology, TD-LTE makes LTE far more interesting (and disruptive) than FDD-LTE alone.

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The press room for the Windows Phone 7 announcement was packed, so I was politely turned away – and so I could see the real unveiling of Windows Phone 7, on the streets of Barcelona (in fact in front of the hotel where the press announcement was made). It was a struggle…

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Want to read the beamforming paper in Russian? Download the Russian version here, along with an addendum.

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Yota is busy these days. The first Russian service provider to deploy a mobile WiMAX network, Yota has signed up over 350,000 customers in the six months since its commercial launch in June 2009.

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