Empowering mobile broadband
The role of regulation in bringing mobile
broadband to the mass market
March 2007
Copyright 2007 WiMAX Forum. All rights reserved. “WiMAX,” “Fixed WiMAX,” “Mobile WiMAX,” “WiMAX Forum,” the
WiMAX Forum logo, "WiMAX Forum Certified,” and the WiMAX Forum Certified logo are trademarks of the WiMAX
Forum. All other trademarks are the properties of their respective owners.
2
Executive Summary
Mass adoption of mobile broadband will profoundly change the way we access the Internet and change
what we do with it. It will extend the user experience of fixed broadband connectivity beyond the home
and the office, and give subscribers wide-area coverage and access to their favorite applications on a
multitude of devices.
Subscribers have become more accustomed to wireless broadband data access and, after experiencing
Wi-Fi wireless connectivity, increasingly expect to have the same broadband experience regardless of
location using multiple mobile devices. Demand for mobile broadband is growing quickly and cannot be
met by cellular technologies like Third Generation (3G) alone. High prices and limited throughput have
kept adoption of 3G data services limited to business users. The popularity of Wi-Fi, the aggressive
growth in the penetration of mobile and nomadic devices, and more generally the growth in fixed
broadband and cellular subscriptions, indicate that the market is now ready for mass adoption of mobile
broadband service. To make this possible, however, they have to be affordable and support both high-
bandwidth and low-latency applications.
Mobile WiMAX™ technology is the technology that best meets the requirements for affordable, high-
performance mobile broadband services. The wide industry support for the technology is a reflection of its
potential to bring mobile broadband services to the mass market. The strength of WiMAX™ technology
stems from a powerful combination of:
-
Advanced performance,
-
A wide variety of devices,
-
Cutting-edge technology,
-
Cos