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Alcatel taps Alvarion for WiMAX kit
French telecom equipment manufacturer Alcatel SA has become the
latest major vendor to sign an OEM partner of Israeli developer Alvarion.
11 Feb 2005
The announcement comes a month after Tel Aviv-based Alvarion went public
with the news that Lucent Technologies was to integrate the wireless
access vendor's BreezeMAX product, which it describes as "WiMAX-ready"
in that it has yet to be certified by the WiMAX Forum, into its
converged communications portfolio.
Carlton O'Neal, VP of marketing for Alvarion recalled that the company
has already been supplying Siemens AG with equipment under an OEM
agreement for several years and, without specifying any timeframe for
further agreements, said the company has "a very active OEM programme."
Alvarion has been in the wireless access space for a decade now, selling
LMDS technology for linking rural users to the phone network, among
other applications, but now the advent of WiMAX technology means major
carriers are becoming interested in its equipment, O'Neal argued.
He added that, unlike many other players in the market, Alvarion's
equipment uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM)
technology, which means it does not need to rely on line of sight to
communicate between access points and devices. |
