Well folks, it was fun while it lasted — sort of. Back in January Nokia swiftly and quietly pulled the plug on its N810 WiMAX Edition, one of the first portable WiMAX devices to reach market. Speculation pointed to the ridiculously slow roll out of the US WiMAX network as one of the main factors behind the decision, though Nokia made no public statement regarding the matter. This left many wondering if the company had abandoned WiMAX development altogether and recent statements from a Nokia executive might suggest the Finnish manufacturer and WiMAX just aren’t going to happen. Specifically, “WiMAX has some place in the market, but we do believe it’s a niche play,” doesn’t exactly leave much open to interpretation. Instead, Nokia is looking at LTE as its future high-speed data technology of choice and seemingly already has compatible devices in the works. In fact, senior manager of technology marketing at Nokia James Harper stated that Nokia intends to release LTE devices as soon as next year. Mobile phones? Internet Tablets? Laptops perhaps? Your guess is as good as ours for the time being. As for Sprint and Clearwire, it’s safe to say that they will be looking elsewhere for WiMAX device partners because Nokia’s ship has sailed.
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