Sprint to Delay Xohm WiMax Service
Barry West, CTO of Sprint, said this week at CTIA Wireless 2008 that the Overland Park, Kans.-based carrier will not make its planned launch of the Xohm WiMax service but that it will come later this year, according to reports.
The delay, in part, comes because Sprint is having trouble setting up the backhaul connections required to set up the WiMax network, West told IDG News Service. Also, trials of the service already running in Chicago and Washington, D.C. aren't performing up to snuff, he said.
Financial concerns are also another problem for Sprint. The struggling company is reportedly soliciting cable operators to invest in the project, which at one time was expected to cost $5 billion.
The delay of Xohm's launch could be bad news for the myriad of companies that are already set to launch new products for the WiMax service.
Nokia at CTIA unveiled its N810 Internet Tablet WiMAX Edition, the vendor's first device built to work with the high-speed networking standard. The Linux-based device features a 4.1-inch touch screen display, a slide-out QWERTY keyboard and support for VoIP and IM clients, including Skype, Google Talk and Gizmo5. It also includes an integrated media player and 2 GBytes of memory. It is scheduled to launch this quarter.
Sprint at CES earlier this year (where Xohm was one of our favorite featured products) said it had signed on several partners, including Amdocs, which will maintain the Xohm Internet portal, SwapDrive for hosted storage, eTelecare Global Solutions for customer care and McAfee for online security for computers connected to the WiMax network.
In addition, several hardware vendors have also disclosed plans for Xohm-compatible devices, including OQO, which will embed wireless connectivity into its ultra-mobile PCs, and AsusTek, which is also building devices with WiMax support. ZyXel and its chip partner, Sequans, said they will be building an access device for the service, dubbed the ZyXel Max-206m2. The device is a 4G modem/router with built-in residential gateway functions. It is scheduled for release in the second quarter of 2008.