Almost everyone is betting on LTE as the next generation wireless technology, because WiMAX adoption has been very limited. The reason behind lower WiMAX adoption has been higher lag time, limited range and about five times lower peak speed (16-20Mbps) when compared to upcoming LTE standard. However, WiMAX Collaboration Initiative (WCI) plans to change that with update to WiMAX standard.

The WCI has started working on WiMAX 2 standard that would decrease lag time, work better at long distances and offer 300Mbps peak speed. The download speed for WiMAX 2 will be three times higher than LTE and more than 15 times higher than present WiMAX networks.

Companies like Intel, Motorola, Samsung and ZTE are working on the WiMAX 2 standard that should be formally introduced in second half of this year. And networks based on the new standard should be implement in 2011. Clearwire one of the WiMAX providers in US has already said that they plan to use WiMAX 2 standard in 2011 to bring download speeds of up to 120Mbps to its customers.