Brazilian WiMAX Equipment Market Worth $300 mill

Dublin, Ireland, April 11, 2006 -- Research and Markets has announced the addition of BWA/WiMAX Brazilian Market Analysis to their offering.

There will be 768,000 accumulated BWA/WIMAX subscribers in Brazil by 2010, of which two thirds will be WiMAX, according to the latest report, titled "BWA/WiMAX Brazilian Market Analysis." This new report, the first of a series that will include reports on Russia, India and other countries, provides an in-depth review of the broadband wireless and WiMAX markets and regulatory activity taking place in Brazil.

"Approximately 70% of those accumulated WiMAX subscribers will be residential mobile users, while fixed WiMAX will continue to be driven by large and SME customers," explained Eduardo Prado and Adlane Fellah, co-authors of the report.

The Brazilian players are anxiously awaiting the new 3.5 GHz auction to start sometime in July 2006, before federal elections due in October 2006. Bidders will want either to expand their current coverage areas or to enter the WiMAX arena. Moreover, positive regulatory changes in the 2.5 GHz band will open the WiMAX market starting 2007.

We predict that the most active players will be companies with deep pockets such as Telemar, Brazil Telecom, Embratel and Telefonica, who are thoroughly testing the technology and crafting their business plans.

"Overall, the total accumulated equipment market size for BWA/WiMAX in Brazil will represent a lucrative US$300 million by 2010, which makes Brazil a key market for BWA/WiMAX vendors for the years to come," Fellah added.

This research also reveals that Brazil remains a very price sensitive market. Demand for broadband services is exploding, but both service providers and residential end-users demand very low cost CPE (in the $100 range) before they will fully adopt WiMAX. So far, the demand for broadband wireless services has been mainly driven by high-end corporate and government users.

"Other important obstacles for massive WiMAX adoption include a rather restrictive regulation around mobility for WiMAX and the fact important market players we interviewed said that they prefer to await the mobile WiMAX version to become widely available before they commit to large network deployments," Prado commented.

Summary
In 2005, the BWA equipment market opportunity was a mere US$6 million, dominated by deployments of unlicensed 5.8 GHz equipment by WISPs and corporate users. However, we believe that with the upcoming auction, the certification of new equipment, and lower-cost equipment, the annual 3.5 GHz equipment opportunity will increase from US$1 million in 2005 to US$33 million in 2010. The 2.5 GHz market opportunity will also become substantial, with shipments projected at US$31 million by 2010. Overall, the total accumulated equipment market for BWA/WiMAX in Brazil should reach US$300 million by 2010, which makes Brazil a key market for BWA/WiMAX vendors for years to come.

With regard to BWA/WiMAX, we project an accumulated 768,000 subscribers by 2010 among residential and business users. WiMAX subscribers should represent two-thirds of this figure. Approximately 70% of the WiMAX subscribers will be mobile customers who are predominately residential, while fixed WiMAX will continue to be driven by large corporations followed by SME customers.

For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/c35218

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News Source: PRWeb