Australia will trail much of the world in seeing notebook PCs equipped with the new WiMax technology, Intel GM Philip Cronin confirmed at yesterday's Down Under launch of its new Centrino 2 platform.
WiMax is not being built into the initial Centrino 2 platform anywhere in the world, Intel has confirmed. However the technology will be integrated into US and UK laptops in the next 90 days but Australia will have to wait until some time in 2009, Cronin said.
He explained that the US and UK were using 2.5GHz spectrum for mobile WiMax, and the Centrino platform was being initially focussed on that. In Australia, the chosen spectrum was 2.3GHz, and a later timeframe had been chosen for the smaller market. (South Korea is also using the 2.3GHz spectrum and presumably faces the same delay).
Given that there is little WiMax available in Australia today, with most action combined to Internode operations in South Australia, this may not be the most burning of issues. However Unwired and Austar have promised widespread rollouts from next year running well over a year behind initial estimates and 3G telephony in the meantime has been running away with the wireless broadband market.
Cronin did have a fair swag of good news about the Centrino platform to inform the gathered media throng at Simmer on the Bay, beside Sydney's Walsh Bay.
