Taiwanese manufacturers gear up to offer WiMAX products
Feb 25, 2008
Taiwanese hi-tech manufacturers are preparing to introduce WiMAX products, with MediaTek Inc. ready to ship WiMAX chips sometime in the first half of the year.
MediaTek Chairman M.K. Tsai is bearish about market for WiMAX applications and estimates the market will begin to take off in 2010. People familiar with the company's WiMAX plan point out the company's WiMAX chips will migrate to 65-nm process geometry when the company begins volume production of the chips. They said MediaTek would first target the chips on computer and handset applications in initial stage.
Asustek Computer projects WiMAX-enabled notebook computers to account for 15% of its total shipment by the end of this year and 20% next year. The company plans to introduce mobile WiMAX customer premise equipment (CPE) in the second quarter.
Quanta Computer's executives pointed out their company will begin shipping WiMAX products in big volume next year and the company is developing WiMAX products now. Quanta Microsystems, owned by Quanta Computer, will plan and manufacture the parent company's WiMAX products.
ZyXEL Communications will begin delivery in April this year WiMAX products that it co-develops in collaboration with Sprint Nextel. ZyXEL Chairman S.Y. Chu pointed out MediaTek will help bring down prices of WiMAX CPE as soon as it begins to ship the chips in the second quarter. Chu estimated WiMAX demands to begin taking off in first quarter next year.
GemTek Technology Co., Ltd. plans to ramp up shipments of WiMAX CPE in second half this year from current 20,000 to 30,000 systems a month. The company's chairman, H.W. Chen, pointed out WiMAX market will likely take heart next half should prices of indoor and outdoor WiMAX CPE considerably drop.
Accton Technology Corp. and its affiliate, Accton Wireless Broadband Corp., are working on new WiMAX products and have maintained close business ties with Motorola, Alcatel-Lucent, NEC and Alvarion Ltd. Accton has begun shipping mobile WiMAX products and planed to ramp up shipments in third quarter this year. The company has projected to ship 300,000 sets of WiMAX products throughout this year, raking in revenue of around NT$1 billion (US$31 million at US$1:32) from the sales.
Recently, Alcatel-Lucent unveiled a WiMAX application and interoperability center in Taiwan. Executives of Taiwanese WiMAX equipment suppliers including MediaTek, GemTek, Asustek, Quanta, ZyXEL and Accton attended the opening ceremony.
source & copyright: CENS
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