Email Delivery

Receive new posts as email.

Email address

Syndicate this site

RSS | Atom

Contact

About This Site
Contact Us
Privacy Policy

Search


January 2011
Sun Mon Tues Wed Thurs Fri Sat
            1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
30 31          

Stories by Category

Basics :: Basics
Casting :: Casting Listen In Podcasts Videocasts
Culture :: Culture Hacking
Deals :: Deals
FAQ :: FAQ
Future :: Future
Hardware :: Hardware Adapters Appliances Chips Consumer Electronics Gaming Home Entertainment Music Photography Video Gadgets Mesh Monitoring and Testing PDAs Phones Smartphones
Industry :: Industry Conferences Financial Free Health Legal Research Vendor analysis
International :: International
Media :: Media Locally cached Streaming
Metro-Scale Networks :: Metro-Scale Networks Community Networking Municipal
Network Types :: Network Types Broadband Wireless Cellular 2.5G and 3G 4G Power Line Satellite
News :: News Mainstream Media
Politics :: Politics Regulation Sock Puppets
Schedules :: Schedules
Security :: Security 802.1X
Site Specific :: Site Specific Administrative Detail April Fool's Blogging Book review Cluelessness Guest Commentary History Humor Self-Promotion Unique Wee-Fi Who's Hot Today?
Software :: Software Open Source
Spectrum :: Spectrum 60 GHz
Standards :: Standards 802.11a 802.11ac 802.11ad 802.11e 802.11g 802.11n 802.20 Bluetooth MIMO UWB WiGig WiMAX ZigBee
Transportation and Lodging :: Transportation and Lodging Air Travel Aquatic Commuting Hotels Rails
Unclassified :: Unclassified
Vertical Markets :: Vertical Markets Academia Enterprise WLAN Switches Home Hot Spot Aggregators Hot Spot Advertising Road Warrior Roaming Libraries Location Medical Public Safety Residential Rural SOHO Small-Medium Sized Business Universities Utilities wISP
Voice :: Voice

Archives

January 2011 | December 2010 | November 2010 | October 2010 | September 2010 | August 2010 | July 2010 | June 2010 | May 2010 | April 2010 | March 2010 | February 2010 | January 2010 | December 2009 | November 2009 | October 2009 | September 2009 | August 2009 | July 2009 | June 2009 | May 2009 | April 2009 | March 2009 | February 2009 | January 2009 | December 2008 | November 2008 | October 2008 | September 2008 | August 2008 | July 2008 | June 2008 | May 2008 | April 2008 | March 2008 | February 2008 | January 2008 | December 2007 | November 2007 | October 2007 | September 2007 | August 2007 | July 2007 | June 2007 | May 2007 | April 2007 | March 2007 | February 2007 | January 2007 | December 2006 | November 2006 | October 2006 | September 2006 | August 2006 | July 2006 | June 2006 | May 2006 | April 2006 | March 2006 | February 2006 | January 2006 | December 2005 | November 2005 | October 2005 | September 2005 | August 2005 | July 2005 | June 2005 | May 2005 | April 2005 | March 2005 | February 2005 | January 2005 | December 2004 | November 2004 | October 2004 | September 2004 | August 2004 | July 2004 | June 2004 | May 2004 | April 2004 | March 2004 | February 2004 | January 2004 | December 2003 | November 2003 | October 2003 | September 2003 | August 2003 | July 2003 | June 2003 | May 2003 | April 2003 | March 2003 | February 2003 | January 2003 | December 2002 | November 2002 | October 2002 | September 2002 | August 2002 | July 2002 | June 2002 | May 2002 | April 2002 | March 2002 | February 2002 | January 2002 | December 2001 | November 2001 | October 2001 | September 2001 | August 2001 | July 2001 | June 2001 | May 2001 | April 2001 |

Recent Entries

WPA Cracked? Unlikely, Despite Headlines
T-Mobile Moves to 42 Mbps HSPA+
Juxtaposition: Qualcomm, Atheros, Verizon, Apple
AT&T Issues 4G Plans, 3G Status Update
Qualcomm Buys Atheros
Staying Safe at Public Hotspots
Kein Freies Mittagessen: Free Hotspots in Europe
The Year Wi-Fi Disappeared
NY Times Biffs It on Wi-Fi Conference Overload
Airborne Internet Nears in Canada

Site Philosophy

This site operates as an independent editorial operation. Advertising, sponsorships, and other non-editorial materials represent the opinions and messages of their respective origins, and not of the site operator. Part of the FM Tech advertising network.

Copyright

Entire site and all contents except otherwise noted © Copyright 2001-2011 by Glenn Fleishman. Some images ©2006 Jupiterimages Corporation. All rights reserved. Please contact us for reprint rights. Linking is, of course, free and encouraged.

Powered by
Movable Type

« Staying Safe at Public Hotspots | Main | AT&T Issues 4G Plans, 3G Status Update »

January 5, 2011

Qualcomm Buys Atheros

Giant mobile chip maker buys wireless networking behemoth: It's a mark of how long I've been covering the industry that I remember when Atheros was a plucky startup, defending its alternative encoding proposal for 802.11g by citing distances the standard could reach in the warehouse the company owned (and used for testing). Ah, it's come a long way to this deal in which Qualcomm has had a $3.1b tender accepted.

Qualcomm makes most of its money from mobile chips and associated patent licenses. The firm's big trouble aren't its finances, but the fact that it doesn't have a terrific path towards future growth of its core technologies. Qualcomm developed, licenses, and sells chips and systems for CDMA, the technology Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel (on Sprint's network) employ in the US. CDMA is in use by hundreds of millions of subscribers worldwide. But GSM is in use by billions.

Worse, Sprint and Verizon both chose paths other than Qualcomm's 4G vision: Sprint acquired a majority interest in Clearwire, which uses WiMax, while Verizon opted for LTE, the dominant GSM-evolved 4G flavor that will be deployed worldwide. Clearwire may eventually swap to LTE as well.

Qualcomm recently sold the spectrum it acquired for a kind of mobile television broadcast system called FLO that never took off. I was always dubious about broadcasting when the future was clearly narrowcasting. Qualcomm bet against the ability to delivery unique streaming video on demand in large quantities. The jury is still out on that over 3G networks; 4G has to be designed to make this practical. (Qualcomm received over three times its purchase price for the FLO spectrum from AT&T—$1.9b—which will use it for LTE, but still took a loss when FLO development and deployment is factored in.)

Qualcomm's purchase of Atheros makes perfect sense, as it gives the company an instant strong position in Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and other related technologies, as well as relationships with most of the major networking vendors and computing manufacturers, including Apple. (Apple uses Wi-Fi and Bluetooth chips from a few vendors, but I believe Atheros and Broadcom remain dominant.)

However, it's worth recalling that Qualcomm also bought Airgo (in 2006), the pioneer in multiple-in, multiple-out (MIMO) antenna system technology when Airgo was at the height of its success in the industry. Airgo disappeared without a trace as a unique technology line, although its clear the patents were sucked into the corporate maw, and some MIMO techniques found themselves built into other products.

2 Comments

LTE *is* Qualcomm's version of 4G (their chips, their IP). Qualcomm sitting pretty for the foreseeable future.

Revisionist history. Qualcomm spent years pushing EVDO Rev. A, B, C, with an evolution into UMB (Ultra Mobile Broadband). It couldn't get enough takers, with its two big US customers opting for WiMax and LTE, and abandoned UMB in favor of LTE (and CDMA/LTE chip support for the future).

Qualcomm owned CDMA from top to bottom; it is a significant minority patentholder (20 to 25 percent of required patents) in LTE. A GSM firm has a little less of the required patents, and several other firms also hold significant patents. Qualcomm can't dictate LTE without sinking itself. Other firms did the initial heavy lifting.

Qualcomm has chips and it will make plenty of money from LTE, but it's a much more competitive market for the firm, which will also see declining CDMA revenue during the transition, where GSM-based chipmakers will have HSPA/HSPA+ upticks during the transition.

Leave a comment