VoIP News: Hardware

Subscriptions to Wi-Max networks grew by 75 per cent last year, rising to 6.8 million subscribers globally, Infonetics Research has said.

The fourth quarter of 2009 was the third consecutive quarter of Wi-Max equipment and device revenue growth, up three per cent from the third quarter of 2009.

Richard Webb, directing analyst for Wi-Max at communications market research and consulting firm Infonetics Research, said: "The Wi-Max market is coming out of the recession period strongly".

The increase in Wi-Max subscriptions could potentially bolster interest in mobileIP telephony solutions, such as applications that emulate VoIP phones.

The functionality of such applications is made available to smartphone users via the wholly mobile internet access Wi-Max offers.

Infonetics Research expects the Wi-Max market to continue growing steadily in 2010 and predicted that high-speed, next-generation Wi-Max will be commercially available by 2011 or 2012.

The number of Wi-Max deployments worldwide in 2009 far outstripped deployments of LTE and HSPA, TeleGeography said recently.

While few Wi-Max networks offer widespread coverage, demand for them is set to increase as they can offer wireless broadband access in rural areas, making mobile VoIP solutions more reliable.

Many businesses already using IP telephony solutions spent last year fortifying the proportion of their voice services dedicated to VoIP phones, In-Stat has said.

According to research by the market intelligence company, this meant that many companies did not expand their VoIP solutions to new locations.

In-Stat's research also found that the proportion of businesses with VoIP capabilities but no traditional TDM voice services rose in 2009.

Hosted telephony, such as IP Centrex and broadband IP telephony, proved popular with businesses in 2009, at the expense of IP PBX.

In-Stat warned that, while the economy and high-tech investments are showing signs of recovering slowly, patience may be needed in anticipating improvements in IP equipment investments.

The healthy growth of the IP telephony solutions market will continue over the next few years, IBISWorld said recently.

George Van Horn, senior analyst at the industry market research company, said that the growth of the VoIP market is expected to "stay strong" in the near future.

He identified enhanced call quality, increased broadband access and the rising profile of the technology's benefits as the drivers for the market over the next few years.

Smartphone sales in the final quarter of 2009 grew by over 41 per cent on the same period in 2008, Gartner has said.

The information technology research and advisory company reported that almost 54 million smartphones were sold in the fourth quarter of last year.

Overall, 172.4 million smartphones were bought in 2009, an increase of almost 24 per cent on 2008 according to the Competitive Landscape: Mobile Devices, Worldwide, 4Q09 and 2009 report.

This growth in smartphone adoption could be reflected in the uptake of mobile VoIP solutions, as smartphone handsets have the capability to utilise apps that emulate VoIP phones.

Google's Android and Apple's iPhone OS were the best performers in the smartphone operating system market in 2009. Gartner expects operating systems to drive the smartphone market in 2010.

Carolina Milanesi, research director at Gartner, said: "We can expect 2010 to retain a strong focus around operating systems, services and applications while hardware takes a back seat".

The number of Wi-Max deployments worldwide in 2009 far outstripped deployments of LTE and HSPA, TeleGeography has said.

Wi-Max has the potential to boost the availability of mobile IP telephony solutions, as networks using the technology offer fully mobile internet access.

Wi-Max will be offered to over one billion people by the end of next year, the WiMAX Forum has said.

The not-for-profit organisation also expects the next generation mobile communication standard 4G to become widely available by that time.

The expansion of Wi-Max coverage could potentially increase mobile IP telephony solutions take-up, such as apps which emulate VoIP phones, as Wi-Max provides entirely mobile internet access.

In February 2009, the WiMAX Forum predicted that Wi-Max networks would reach 800 million people by the end of 2010.

However, with Wi-Max providers already offering network coverage to 620 million people in around 147 countries, this figure is expected to be topped by the year's end.

Ron Resnick, president and chairman of the WiMAX Forum, said that these figures show that Wi-Max "will continue to meet the global market demand for high-speed broadband access in developed and emerging regions".

The number of Wi-Max deployments worldwide in 2009 far outstripped deployments of LTE and HSPA, TeleGeography said recently.

While few Wi-Max networks offer widespread coverage, demand for them is set to increase as they can offer wireless broadband access in rural areas, making mobile VoIP solutions more reliable.

The number of Wi-Max deployments worldwide in 2009 far outstripped deployments of LTE and HSPA, TeleGeography has said.

There were over 600 Wi-Max networks rolled out last year, compared to only 300 HSPA networks and 70 LTE networks, according to the global communications markets research company.

Wi-Max has the potential to boost the availability of mobileIP telephony solutions, as networks using the technology offer fully mobile internet access.

While few Wi-Max networks offer widespread coverage, demand for them is set to increase as they can offer wireless broadband access in rural areas, making mobile VoIP solutions more reliable.

This demand will see Wi-Max continue to grow, despite TeleGeography predicting that the next-generation mobile communication standard LTE and HSPA, another mobile broadband technology, will begin to supersede it in 2010.

"While the footprint of Wi-Max worldwide is still growing steadily, LTE deployments should gain momentum in 2010 and 2011," Peter Bell, analyst at TeleGeography.

The roll-out of LTE could be the "revolutionary" catalyst for the transition of VoIP phones and broadband speeds to mobile devices, broadband communications forum BroadbandIgnite said recently.