IPWireless finally gets its ecosystem with NextWave's WiMAX TV
Sprint Nextel CTO Barry West, when trialing network and mobile TV technologies for what became the Xohm WiMAX system, said in 2006: "Impressive technology, and we probably would have gone with it, if it had enough of an ecosystem around it." In choosing WiMAX networks from Nokia Siemens, Samsung and Motorola, West offered no hint about how Xohm would deliver mobile TV. Now Sprint may have the opportunity to look at the technology once again if NextWave can convince one or more of the Xohm base station suppliers to take its MXtv software and bundle it, as Huawei and Alcatel-Lucent have done, with their base stations.
The MXtv system will deliver as many as 45 mobile TV channels in Quarter VGA at 30 frames a second, each taking up around 300Kbps, in a single 10MHz WiMAX channel. It also offers channel switching times of under two seconds. Most operators won't have a full 10MHz of spectrum to throw at this, and Jon Hambidge, chief marketing officer of NextWave Network Products, told us: "If people want to offer 20 TV channels, then they will still have around 60% of their mobile broadband capacity left, which is fine for year one or year two of a new WiMAX network, and after that they can think about using more spectrum."
The system is entirely flexible on how much spectrum an operator dedicates to Mobile TV versus how much it uses for other applications. More unicast streamed video can also be sent over the mobile broadband capacity to customers on a one-to-one basis, creating the possibility of a wide range of mobile TV bouquets with MXtv, just as in TDtv. The system can dynamically allocate spectrum to TV services based on content availability, time-of-day requirements, user demand, and the availability of 'must see' live events such as sports, concerts, interactive reality shows or emergency broadcasts.
MXtv works with wave two 802.16e base stations that implement the MBS (Mobile Broadcast Services) element of the standard. "All of the new ranges of WiMAX devices that are coming out now, and all those that Sprint has installed to date, are all wave two compliant," Hambidge explained. But NextWave has added a few extra features to the basic MBS services. One is designed to enhance spectral diversity benefits. WiMAX base stations tend to operate as a three-way (or more) configuration of radios, with each one using a different channel of spectrum to ensure it does not interfere with its neighbor. The MXtv idea is to create the equivalent of a single frequency network, and each of the radio segments in a base station will select an OFDM frame to broadcast the TV services. So a client device gets one TV signal from a nearby base station, and another copy of the same signal (in slightly varying frequency) from a neighboring base station. Then the NextWave mobile CPE chip combines the two signals to get a signal lift out of them to improve reception.
Another thing that NextWave can bring to the party is the Media Fusion Platform from another member of the stable, PacketVideo. This provides handset-side and server-side electronic service guide (ESG) data, search and navigation, and a dynamically constructed ESG. Media Fusion is also being given the job of solving how to handle addressable advertising. At the Mobile World Congress PacketVideo also launched a matchbox-sized device that can receive mobile TV signals, and either plug straight into a handset or convert the signals to Wi-Fi so that any Wi-Fi enabled player can view mobile TV broadcasts. This would include the iPod Touch and the iPhone, as well as the Nokia N Series and Windows Mobile devices. The idea is to allow mobile subscribers to upgrade to advanced mobile TV services without changing their handset. Presumably PacketVideo will now offer a WiMAX MBS version of this gadget as well, which is perhaps why NextWave is suggesting that its chip can be used to create mobile TV devices that are not mobile two-way handsets, making room for consumer devices like personal media players, handheld gaming or navigational devices and DVD players within the scheme.
The company is also offering its own Content Delivery Network and its own version of an MBS controller. Further backwards into the core, it can use the identical video software that is used for its TDtv services.
Although NextWave plans to sell its own base stations and just launched its own Wave two compliant system, because MXtv is delivered in a software layer it can easily be offered to rival base station suppliers. But then, in order to take advantage of the lift from effectively creating a single frequency network, the handset vendors will all have to work with the NextWave NW2000 MXtv-enabled WiMAX System-on-a-Chip (SoC) to offer optimized mobile TV. The SoC also allows roaming across worldwide WiMAX frequencies and profiles, as well as being able to work with Wi-Fi. It is built in 65nm CMOS and the company says it is optimized for VoIP, real time streaming or gaming.
The deal with Huawei was announced a day ahead of the Alcatel deal, and under the agreement Huawei will integrate MXtv Macro-Diversity Multicast and Broadcast technology into its own base station platform and ASN-GW network platforms. The two companies have already completed initial design and are undergoing integration and interoperability testing. The combined Huawei's/NextWave system should be with us commercially at the end of second quarter 2008.
NextWave followed up with an immediate duplicate agreement with Alcatel-Lucent and plans to perform interoperability tests with Alcatel-Lucent's commercial WiMAX infrastructure starting in the second quarter of 2008.
Copyright © 2008 by Rethink Research. All Rights Reserved.
No reproduction without consent.
