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Motorola at CTIA

Posted on March 22, 2010 by Mari Silbey

Headed out to Vegas for CTIA? Here’s what Motorola has cooking on the 4G front.

LTE

Last week Motorola announced a new TD-LTE eNodeB 4Tx/8Rx product with multiple input/multiple output (MIMO). It will be on display at CTIA as part of a full portfolio of TD-LTE and FDD-LTE solutions. Motorola will also demo its LTE self-organizing network (SON) for lowering total network costs in LTE deployments.

WiMAX

Once again Motorola will have Clear WiMAX service live at the show along with a full line of WiMAX products. Motorola also announced a new WiMAX customer this morning in St. Maarten. CaribServ has chosen the Motorola Low-Teledensity ASN 1000 Gateway for its WiMAX deployment. And Sprint just awarded Motorola a new services contract, the fifth one in five consecutive years.

More to come from the show floor. Stay tuned for talk on 2G/3G migrations to 4G, the move to 802.16m, and a World Tour display of Motorola’s 4G technology.

Filed under: LTE, Motorola News, Networks, WiMAX, Wireless | 1 Comment »

World’s First TD-LTE Showcase Network

Posted on February 26, 2010 by Mari Silbey

The Shanghai Expo is still months away from opening, but Motorola announced this week that it has already set up a showcase TD-LTE network for the spring and summer event. The successful demonstration this week included the world’s first indoor, over-the-air TD-LTE data sessions. As announced last fall, Motorola will be the main provider of TD-LTE coverage during the Shanghai Expo, and will show the world’s first LTE USB adapters at the event in May.

Filed under: Internet, LTE, Motorola News, Networks, Wireless | Leave a Comment »

Is LTE Enough?

Posted on February 22, 2010 by Mari Silbey

Although LTE is just getting off the ground, the word on the street (already) is that LTE on its own may not be enough to satisfy wireless broadband demand. At the same time, according to an article in The Independent, mobile broadband sales in some mature markets are not growing fast enough to support major capex spending for 4G upgrades. Put those two issues together, and you come up with the conclusion that LTE isn’t a broadband panacea. By itself, LTE isn’t enough.

Motorola’s Bruce Brda spoke on the topic of combining wireless broadband technologies while in Barcelona last week. In the short video below, you can hear his argument that operators will need a mix of technologies including FDD LTE and TD-LTE, WiMAX, and even Wi-Fi. It’s a big change from carrier models in the past.

Filed under: Internet, LTE, Networks, WiMAX, Wireless | 1 Comment »

MWC News of the Week

Posted on February 17, 2010 by Mari Silbey

You can follow along with all the news coming out of Motorola at Mobile World Congress over on the MWC digital press kit site. However, in case you’ve missed any news to date, here are some highlights from the press announcements I haven’t yet covered here. A little GSM, WiMAX and LTE all rolled into one.

New Dual-Mode Radios Optimized for LTE and GSM/E-Edge

Early on Monday Motorola announced new dual-mode base station radios designed to support migrations from GSM to LTE. The new CTU8m series radios support up to eight GSM carriers, or a combination of up to eight GSM and LTE carriers. At the same time, Motorola also introduced a new next-gen 19″ rack-mountable GSM base-band unit, the Horizon 2G-nx BBU.

Service Quality Optimization for Mobile Operators

On the second day of MWC, Motorola launched service quality optimization (SQO) as part of its global professional services portfolio. The SQO service includes analysis of end-user data streams, performance measurement against key quality indicators (KQI), and adjustments to both network elements and business processes. Given the complexity involved in managing diverse network environments, the new SQO offering is well-timed for operator migrations to 4G technology.

FITEL Awards Motorola a Second WiMAX Contract

Also today, Motorola announced a new WiMAX contract with First International Telecom (FITEL) in Taiwan. It’s the second WiMAX contract with FITEL, following an initial WIMAX deployment back in 2008. WiMAX rolls on.

Filed under: LTE, Motorola News, Networks, Telecom, WiMAX, Wireless | 1 Comment »

Photos from Mobile World Congress

Posted on February 16, 2010 by Mari Silbey

Missing out on the Barcelona experience? Not to worry, between blog and Twitter coverage, it’s not difficult to stay up to date on MWC happenings. And in case you’re the visual kind, here are some photos from the show floor. Check out the LTE cafe in the second thumbnail below. The white box on the left includes a live, working Motorola LTE chipset. Meanwhile the photo of men in suits includes the Russian Minister of Telecommunications, Igor Shegolev. He’s the one right under the sign for optimization services.

UPDATE: I just learned that at one point today the LTE network running in the cafe hit 166 Mbps. That’s just two Mbps off the theoretical max. Lots of buzzing around the Motorola booth when that happened.