Comments on: What is so special about the 700 MHz band?

By: mmarius

mmarius — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 16:27:30 +0000

In reply to RD.

Excellent point, RD.

I too sense that the focus on LTE appears a bit gimmicky, especially since it is being touted as “4G”, when it truly is not so. However, having said this, I think the region is acutely aware of the strides it has made on the voice comms front, thanks to the widespread rollout low cost mobile services, and now is keen to narrow the gap with respect to data comms.

However I am not sure that we in the Caribbean have properly considered key Internet Governance issues, which many developed countries have already done. Hence we may find ourselves either scrambling to address these longstanding issues or cornered into making certain decisions because we have not fully thought through how best to transition to Information Societies…

By: RD

RD — Tue, 16 Oct 2012 15:51:25 +0000

There was a sell off of 700MHz spectrum in the USA two or three years ago which attracted some big names and a lot of money was offered at the time. This seemed to be the motivation for the initial offering in the Caribbean…but was not realized. I am also aware that LTE still has a way as far as Standards is concerned. I think the Caribbean is sometimes too keen to want the latest novelty that appears on the technology front without a focus deployment of technologies which are mature and work well, and have the capability of building technical capacity locally.

By: JJ Poulter

JJ Poulter — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 12:47:23 +0000

Great article! In the United States, the 700MHz spectrum is reserved for emergency services, right? As a result, wireless microphone and monitor companies (eg Sennheiser) producing units using that spectrum can’t retail those units in the States. In the five ECTEL Member States, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, since they have reserved the spectrum for wireless broadband, do you know how this might affect those using wireless microphones and monitoring systems for public events – might using such devices in this spectrum be banned in these territories as a result? Will the 2 types of use potentially conflict? Be interesting to know.

By: Kamutula

Kamutula — Sun, 14 Oct 2012 07:44:40 +0000

I know that the previous article “EDGE, WiMAX, 3G or 4G – what’s the difference?” is mentioned and duly referenced in the article, but I think including it on the list of “Related posts” ( Evolving Over the Long Term: Considerations towards implementing LTE , etc ) will bemore helpful.

For me, now having read through the three articles clearly amplify the core principles underlying these technologies.