Samsung Electronics, the world’s third-largest cell phone producer, has struck a deal with Beijing Airway Communications to launch WiBro services in China, reports The Korean Times.
A Samsung executive Thursday said that Airway, a Beijing-based Internet service provider, is expected to kick-start WiBro, known as mobile WiMax in the rest of the world _ next year.
“We signed the contract with Airway months ago but have kept it secret at the request of the Chinese government,” said the Samsung executive, who declined to be named. “We are also in talks with other Chinese telecom operators such as China Netcom and Chinacomm to work out WiBro agreements,” he said.
Established in 1998, Beijing Airway offers various telecom services including a fixed-line Internet. China Netcom is the country’s No. 2 landline telecom carrier. Spokespersons of Samsung Electronics refused to confirm the deal with Airway and negotiations with China Netcom or Chinacomm.
Mobile WiMAX chipsets that conform to Wave 2 specs, like Beceem’s BCS200, support both MIMO and beamforming. They deliver 25Mbps total throughput with around 20Mbps available on the downlink, more than 25% reduction in power consumption and more than 60% reduction in footprint compared to wave 1, making it more suited to small devices such as handsets.
The WiBro penetration of China is projected to give much-awaited momentum to Korea’s homegrown Internet-on-the-go services, which are struggling to take root there. Meanwhile, Samsung is incorporating the Opera browser on some of its phones. Samsung has used Adaptix technology for their base station architecture.
Korean telecom carriers, KT and SK Telecom, began offering WiBro service this year but the system has suffered from start-up glitches and its customer base amounts to only thousands.
Related Dailywireless articles include; New China Transpacific Cable, SK Telecom + UWB = Kiosk Downloads?, Channel 1 WiBro for the U.S. Military?, Japan: 3rd Largest Broadband Market, Mobile WiMAX: It Begins, China/US Space News, and Samsung’s 4G.
