Verizon Goes with LTE

Tired of stories about Verizon yet?  It's a sign of a well-run company that they manage their PR in such a way so as to continually attract as much attention as possible. First it was openness for devices and networks, and now it's their selection of the 3GPP's Long Term Evolution (LTE) (new name still needed here) technology as their 4G direction. This news was not all that unexpected - Vodaphone, the other owner (45%) of Verizon Wireless, is a GSM/UMTS carrier and will obviously go with LTE. And CDMA is on the way out as the basis for future broadband technologies anyway, to be replaced by OFDM, the basis of LTE (and many others). The reason for this, BTW, has nothing do with the technical superiority of OFDM, although I often hear that the spectral efficiency of OFDM is superior at larger (20+ MHz.) channel bandwidths. Rather, CDMA is near the end of its useful life because the patents covering it will be running out over the next few years, and there's not a lot left to patent here. Many thought that OFDM would be the way the industry would get away from Qualcomm's IP hegemony over CDMA. But it appears that not too many know that Qualcomm owns more than 700 OFDM patents, plus they have MIMO/OFDM experts from their acquisition of Airgo Networks. I've always thought (and continue to think) that Qualcomm will begin its OFDM hegemony by eventually going after the WiMAX community once WiMAX gets established (and it will, paticularly in emerging economies), so being free of paying royalties to Qualcomm may remain an abstract, theoretical concept.

And speaking of WiMAX, while Verizon going LTE doesn't help, it doesn't really hurt, either, as no one expected Verizon to deploy WiMAX anyway. The bigger question is whether Verizon will eventually deploy GSM/UMTS, but I don't think that's in the cards, nor is their deployment of HSPA, ahead of LTE, anyway. LTE can be operated like EV-DO, in a separate channel. The only question then, is subscriber units that can handle both CDMA and LTE, and I don't think that will prove to be too difficult. And it's a given that Verizon Wireless will eventually migrate their entire installed base to LTE, so the incentive for handset vendors is already in place.

So the other question is whether this is the end of the road for Ultra Mobile Broadband, the CDMA Development Group's 4G effort. Despite much better specs than LTE (nominally 280 Mbps vs. 100 for LTE), it likely is. Of the big US carriers, only Sprint at present isn't going the LTE route - they're still doing WiMAX, not UMB. LTE itself will evolve over time to higher throughput regardless, so the UMB fruit may die on the vine. Cool stuff regardless.

And finally, as is the case with openness, it's us customers that will ultimately benefit here. If LTE becomes a global standard, and it just might, the logistics, if not the costs, of roaming will be simplified. More win/win all around. This truly is the season of wonders.