Brazil's adoption of WiMax technology will be good for the economy as it will generate new revenues while connecting people, US chip manufacturer Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) Latin America general director Jesus Maximoff told BNamericas.
"We spend a significant amount of time with the regulator, talking about what we see in other countries in terms of technology. Our job is to demonstrate the infrastructure is there, the technology is there, that it works, that it offers a significant advantage to the Brazilian economy and the country's citizens," said Maximoff on the sidelines of the Futurecom telecoms industry conference held in São Paulo.
The company is not particularly plugging WiMax or 3G, according to the executive. It is only a matter of fast deployment - enabling wide and fast mobile broadband internet access at a low cost for users.
"Intel believes in giving impulse to any type of broadband because the company's business is to sell processors and this depends on connectivity. We have over 100 projects with operators which offer 3G," said Maximoff.
The limitations Maximoff sees in 3G are that it is an excellent technology for voice but lacking in capacity for data, and the future for the mobile sector is data traffic. Also, 3G implementation costs are higher due to the differing certification requirements in each country.
In fact, the chip for WiMax, which is a relatively new technology, costs 50% less than the 3G chip - even more astounding when considering that the latter has been in the market for four years, said Maximoff. "Also, WiMax has a capacity that is 300 times higher than a 3G network."
The executive added that the technology, equipment and infrastructure are already available and that it is only a matter of the telecoms regulator freeing up spectrum for WiMax to be implemented in order for society in general to reap the benefits.
According to Maximoff, worldwide there currently are 300 WiMax networks in operation and another 109 pilots, including the São Paulo network owned by the Brazilian unit of Spanish telco Telefónica (NYSE: TEF).
"We are really excited that there is a pilot in São Paulo. It's a great opportunity to see how the networks and the devices work out there. We've been talking about WiMax for three years but until you see it, you don't know how amazing the experience is. It could help to reduce the digital gap in the country," he said.
INVESTMENTS DURING CRISIS
"We will not stop global investments, especially in emerging markets and new technologies, and Intel tends to increase investments in times of crisis in order to be prepared when we leave the crisis behind," said Maximoff.
According to the executive, over 50% of Intel's sales come from outside the US and Western Europe and the trend is for this percentage to grow even more during the next few years.
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