4G Backhaul: A Problem for All?
We already know that the challenge of providing back-end capacity for faster base-stations helped delay the launch of Sprint Nextel Corp.'s Xohm WiMax, so could 4G backhaul be a problem for all carriers moving to faster broadband networks?
The issue with 4G backhaul is a simple one: T1-line backhaul, which many carriers -- particularly in the U.S. -- use extensively, cannot cope with base stations that pump out data at hundreds of megabits a second to provide a few megabits-a-second data downloads to each individual user. Yet faster data downloads are supposed to be what sells so-called 4G services -- be they WiMax or Long-Term Evolution -- to consumers. Carriers, meanwhile, want 4G to further bump up data revenues, which are supposed to supplant declining voice revenue over time.
