Intel earmarks $500M for WiMAX deployment in Taiwan

Intel Corp. will invest $500 million in Taiwan over the next five years, with the bulk of the investment targeted for WiMAX, according to Yahoo! India.

The chip giant said there are still technical challenges that need to be solved for the high-speed wireless standard, but that it has been encouraged by the development of WiMAX in the past two years.

Managing director for Intel's WiMAX program Li Mohan confirmed that the investment is largely for WiMAX. Mohan said the company expects WiMAX to be commercially deployed by Q2 or Q3 in the United States and infrastructure in Asia should be ready by 2009-2010.

In October 2007 the Taiwan government announced plans to spend $664 million in the next few years on the WiMAX development. Mohan estimates that Japan may be the first to launch the service, having invested lots of money for the technology, while Taiwan and India could follow suit.