Linkem links up with Alca-Lu for Lazio WiMAX

Alcatel-Lucent has announced in a press release that it has been selected by Italian wireless broadband operator Linkem to provide a turnkey WiMAX 802.16e-2005 network in the Lazio region, with Terracina in Latina province the first city scheduled to be covered by the rollout. Linkem owns WiMAX licences in 13 Italian regions, reaching from north to south and covering 80% of the population. The ISP aims to use Alca-Lu’s WiMAX access solution to connect underserved regions and provide consumers, enterprises and public sector organisations with high speed broadband access and other services. Alca-Lu will provide mobile WiMAX infrastructure, including the radio access network, microwave backhaul and IP routers supporting VoIP, high speed internet access, and broadband multimedia services such as videostreaming, through a variety of end-user devices including modems and WiMAX terminals. The French-US vendor’s 802.16e-2005 (also known as ‘Rev-e’) technology was selected on the grounds of efficiency in supporting fixed communications, while supporting nomadic traffic, and for its ‘superior’ interoperability with standard commercially available customer premises equipment (CPE), thanks to its Open CPE platform. Linkem was founded in 2001 under the name Megabeam Italia and was the country’s first WISP (Wireless Internet Service Provider) to launch in 2003.