So now here we are, one year later, and the idea of something other than LTE being the priority for companies exhibiting at and visiting MWC is just silly.

So what can we expect this year?

I think we can expect exactly what you would think – new products and services based on LTE.

This year, I think it’s clear that the excitement surrounding LTE is likely to be in the area of devices, such as tablets, smartphones and other core hardware, of which there are many tens already today.

And considering that Altair is a chipset manufacturer that is providing the brains behind all these devices, I guess it’s understandable that we have 80+ meetings booked at MWC this year with customers, partners and the media/analysts.

But there is something else that is sure to be making some noise at this year’s show, although the bigger splash may take place next year.

The something else is Google, Facebook and other “service” providers.

And I have a feeling that they are going to make it clear that LTE is not just the next generation of devices and network that will provide faster performance than 3G.

So off we go to Barcelona, and I’ll be sure to circle back with you after the show to let you know what took place. ¡Hasta luego!

- Eran Eshed

Then, there was an article about China and the future importance of FDD.

But similar to my views regarding Qualcomm’s big announcement a couple of weeks ago, I see the Clearwire-China Mobile announcement as a major milestone for all of us. More importantly, I see it as a catalyst for some kind of standardization in a wide open market.

And the MIIT testing results are important as well. Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, Nokia-Siemens, Huawei and ZTE – the major infrastructure players – now have a green light, in essence, to move ahead much more aggressively with development, now that several of us in the industry have achieved approval by the MIIT.

It’s another example of what is becoming much more frequent these days: The LTE ecosystem is getting ready for prime time, especially when an operator the size of China Mobile begins to form alliances and partnerships with service providers and infrastructure vendors.

So the Clearwire deal was news coming out of China, but you can be sure the news is reverberating around the entire globe …

-Eran Eshed

That is certainly the case for us in the LTE space. For example, one trend is that players without long-term telecom track records are getting into the game by winning the rights to their nations’ LTE licenses. This is the case in countries such as India, with Reliance, and Russia, with Yota.

These players are then rolling out their own services to subscribers and simultaneously licensing their networks to other traditional carriers, making for the classic win-win, where everyone should be able to make money.

Of course, these developments are only good news for us, and only bad news for WiMAX, because – looking at the Russia situation, for instance – as the LTE services come online, the WiMAX services are going to be wound down.

Another example of this new-kid-on-the-block trend is Brazil, where Sky, a broadcaster, is deploying LTE.

So that’s a trend. But what has always fascinated me are the sub-trends, like when the iPad was introduced and it resulted in an entire industry around the device, including anything from holding-cases, to screen-protectors to, of course, accessories.

There is a sub-trend developing here in the LTE space as well, which is that the more organic approach (LTE) is winning the day. Just like with music, where the MP3 was the logical next step after CDs, given that music was being digitized, we are also seeing quite an evolutionary process play out with LTE beating WiMAX, even if LTE is also certainly disruptive.

So on the one hand, non-traditional players are creating quite a stir by getting so deeply involved so quickly. On the other hand, there is a certain natural development we are seeing on the technology side that is sure to give peace-of-mind to anyone close to the industry.

After all, upheavals are never comfortable.

- Eran Eshed

In marathon running, there are various entities that always make things interesting. There are the rabbits, who are paid to set out at a blistering pace, but often don’t even complete the race. There are those who start slow, in the hope that by conserving energy, they will have more in the tank at the latter stages of the race. There are pacers, who are there to run the race in a specific, predetermined time, so that those who want to finish in that time know to stay close to the pacer. There are the fans, who line up along the side of the course, cheering on the runners, no matter how well each one of the runners may be doing at any given time.

I can go on and on, but it’s probably a good idea to shift to LTE at this point in this discussion.

As you run a marathon, you have lots of time on your hands to think about a lot of things. And about halfway through the race last Thursday, I realized that the marathon is quite similar to what we’ve seen take place in the LTE market.

There are rabbits – those players who got off to an early fast start, by marketing the heck out of themselves even if they may not have had what it takes to even make it to the finish line with a commercial product. They got the early glory – they looked great – but ultimately wound up falling back and not even finishing the "race". And yes, they made some money for their troubles.

The media (the fans along the course) cheered on the rabbits, because they looked so fast and strong early on in the race.

There are those who have a tremendous amount of experience. You know they will complete the race. You know their times will be solid. But they will do it at their pace, and will not let outside factors impact them.

And then there are the real winners. Those are the players who put together a plan, spend a long time refining their product, and execute on the strategy perfectly. I believe Altair can be in this category if we continue to execute, but as I said, the marathon is a long race, so it’s too early to tell. But the payoff for the winners is certainly worth all the hard work.

Oh, and if you are wondering how my marathon went, I finished with a personal best of 3:36:54.

- Eran Eshed

I’d like to suggest that a fundamental dynamic at play here. We all know that LTE is faster than 3G. Much faster. And we know that the relative cost for that speed is quite reasonable.

But is it so much so that people will be willing to end their current user agreements, upgrade to 4G phones and sign new contracts?

The answer, it would seem – at least according to this report – is no. And the reason is that there are no apps in place yet that make a user say, "Wow! I want my LTE!"

I’ve mentioned in the past that the real market-maker for 4G is going to be the non-phone devices, such as tablets, cloud computing, M2M applications, dongles, etc. On the consumer side, video has not proven to be the key market-making application – in terms of the smartphone market. So there is a major answer that needs to be provided for the consumer market to take off.

What I am particularly interested in, within the context of the report I mentioned above, is what will we see at the upcoming CES in Las Vegas? Is that market-making application there, or are we going to have to hope that users are compelled by high-speed Internet service alone?

Because I just don’t think High-speed Internet is compelling enough.

So as we head into the New Year, now that LTE is here, let’s all hope we see some exciting and compelling applications that will drive the consumer LTE market.

Happy New Year.

- Eran Eshed

But as you know, a high price tag can be determined through many factors, not only based on the cost of the core technology.

And that is why I’m particularly excited about something that Altair is doing – and that it seems others are trying to do as well.

It’s called Open Platform™, and you may know of it – at least conceptually – from IT and other areas of hi-tech. For example, those who use the Linux operating system love that it is open, because it enables them to develop whatever they want to develop, however they want to develop it, and run it without concern on Linux. You can read more about that here.

But for us, open equals lower-cost. And that is why I’m excited about it.

At the end of the day, LTE is a communications channel. If you want to send or receive information, LTE is becoming the fastest channel to do so wirelessly. But it is also a channel that requires a processor to make any application run. And that means that a high-end application, like a graphics-intense Android application, requires a high-end processor. But it also means that lower-end applications, such as most machine-to-machine applications or even OS-independent USB dongles (very trendy, sometimes referred to as “Hostless Dongles”), only require a lower-end processor to run.

That being the case, the last thing service providers need for supporting such types of applications – is a high-cost processor. At the very least, that will take some of the cost savings of LTE out of the equation. That is not making the most of LTE’s promise.

So, at the risk of sounding like I’m shamelessly plugging my own product, Altair’s one-size-fits-all chipset has an integrated applications processor running embedded Linux. Leave the external $3-5 processor out of the equation. All that is necessary is a software package that is designed for low-cost applications.

Ultimately, the whole industry will get with the program, and the end users will be the beneficiaries. But until then, we like to think that we are setting somewhat of a standard by building this integrated, Open Platform™ processor into our open chipset.

After all, it’s good to be open-minded, right?

- Eran Eshed

And while six months ago, you could chalk up the advertising to no more than hype, times have changed quickly, and each of those companies now has a true-blue 4G offering that is much faster than 3G services were.

Sprint is lagging behind for now, but they will certainly catch up. And one of these players will be first to offer the LTE-enabled iPhone, whenever that device is ready.

But overall, the big guys – Verizon Wireless and AT&T, and eventually Sprint – will all get to the same point. And then what?

Well, the truth is that for all the advertising Verizon Wireless and AT&T are buying today focused on the consumer market, they are not seeing such a high level of customer churn they way one might expect when a market’s situation is changing as dramatically as this one is, thanks to LTE’s arrival.

All that adds up to a business question for each of these companies:

If the consumer market will only result in revenues – and not an increased market share – then what will the key growth engine be for the future?

The answer: business applications, specifically M2M, or machine-to-machine applications. That’s where huge potential growth lies, and that is where companies like Verizon Wireless and AT&T would serve themselves well by focusing.

What is particularly exciting here is that if these guys can shift their focus to M2M, the sky truly is the limit for how big LTE becomes.

And you can be sure that we are all readying ourselves for lift-off!

- Eran Eshed

Yes, everyone had something to say about it. So rather than jumping on the bandwagon right away, I thought I would give it a week, and then contribute my take, which not-so-surprisingly focuses on Altair.

When I heard about Jobs’ death, I immediately thought to myself, "Wow. When Apple launched the first iPhone, I remember the first presentation that he gave at MacWorld 2007."

Why do I remember it so well? I’ll tell you why. Because the moment I saw it, I booked a conference room for the whole company (10 people at the time), and I told them that this (the iPhone) is going to be what will make our company successful, whether or not we sell chips to Apple.

I told them that this advanced smartphone concept is going to change how people receive information.

On that day, I made everyone in the company sit down and watch the entire video of the iPhone launch. And then they understood.

You know, there is currently a debate on whether the iPhone 5 will or will not be LTE-ready, but that simply doesn’t matter, because we will certainly see mobile broadband on it.

Are LTE chips too big for the iPhone? That doesn’t really matter, because it is all just a matter of time, and whether LTE is part of the iPhone 5 or 5.5 or even 6, Steve Jobs put the wheels in motion for all this.

We at Altair owe our own little debt of gratitude to Steve Jobs and to Apple, regardless of whether they ultimately integrate our chips or not.

May Steve Jobs rest in peace.

- Eran Eshed