Tata Group Company, Tata Elxsi is rapidly consolidating a prime position for itself in the product engineering space and software solutions for complete systems in the wireless and telecom market.

The company claims to be the world’s largest third party software supplier in the WiMAX space. Strategically, the company has aligned its business activities in the telecom vertical into providing software solutions, building a rich bank of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) and lastly offering vertical specific solutions to industries.

The last focus is very interesting as it actually reflects a measure of the company’s innovation quotient. While globally there is a heated debate going on about the potential of WiMAX as a connectivity medium to offer wireless broadband services to retail and enterprise customers, Tata Elxsi has identified unique applications for WiMAX services, which involves using the technology as a connectivity medium.

The firm has used this concept in North America for smart grid projects that is considered to be a very significant opportunity in the USA with the government funding 60 such projects. “Tata Elxsi is using WiMAX as a means to provide system integration.

“As compared to cellular and satellite mode of connectivity, we found that WiMAX provided a more suitable financial as well as technological alternative for smart grid communications,” says Nitin Pai, Vice President & Head – Marketing, Tata Elxsi Limited while speaking to TelecomTiger. “The success achieved in the North America market opens up new avenues for us in Europe, Middle East and South Asia” adds Pai.

The company has also designed specific solutions for defence and public safety, including customized mesh networks based on WiMAX technology. It also foresees use of WiMAX technology in the Oil & Gas industry for exploration, drilling and production areas.

And it is just not the WiMAX space where the company is focused. As a proactive business move, the company has lined up solutions for the upcoming demand from LTE market as well. “We recently demonstrated a complete reference design for a 3GPP Release 8 compliant LTE base station at MWC in Barcelona, successfully interoped with leading third party UEs and streaming HD video at high data rates. This underlines the maturity of Tata Elxsi’s high performance LTE protocol stacks including L1, L2 and L3 software and turn-key system engineering capability” adds Pai.

“Another strategic shift in focus is to offer complete micro / pico and femto base station reference solutions for LTE, even as leading telecom vendors are focusing on large macro base station solutions.”

Even in the Indian context, Pai sees a very strong play for WiMAX at least for the next three-five years.

“At Tata Elxsi, we feel that we are very well placed to cater to the 3G and 4G segments with our rich IPR and solutions portfolio,” concludes Pai.