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Whether CDMA-based or GSM-based, cellular service providers have been highly successful in targeting consumers. However, enterprise customers have largely remained outside their domain despite the growing prominence of wireless in enterprise environments. Limitations on throughput and other performance-related issues have kept service providers away from successfully marketing or creating services for enterprises. CDMA 1x EVDO (evolution-data optimized) can change all this.

Touted by the CDMA protagonists as the next big thing in the evolution of cellular technology, CDMA 1x EVDO would offer service providers an opportunity to tap high-value, enterprise customers and thereby take ARPU to new levels of profitability. The promise of 1x EVDO is: it affords the mobile enterprise customers a truly broadband high speed (peak data speed up to 2.4 Mbps). This would mean that enterprise mobile users would be able to converge in-office applications with mobile applications. For instance, Verizon Wireless' 1x EVDO (in parts of the US) provides mobile VPN connections with typical access speeds of 300–500 kbps with bursts of up to 2.0 Mbps.

Besides high speed, CDMA 1x EVDO offers several other advantages over its predecessor cdmaOne or CDMA2000 voice networks. These include better utilization of spectrum resources leading to much faster downstream throughput-three to five times improvement in network capacity and security of data. The 1x EVDO's IP-based security features are optimized to handle enterprise IT and mobile user requirements.

Given all this, 1x EVDO would be driving new mobile-data subscription rates. Also, it can substantially drive down the cost of delivering data on mobile networks. In other words, service providers can not only benefit from their ability to offer new data services but also by way of operational cost savings. According to assessments done by Qualcomm and Airvana, the cost of delivering 1 MB of data on today's mobile networks is estimated to vary from approximately $0.40 to $0.70, depending on the network. With 1x EVDO, these rates can be slashed to $0.22 per MB.

Technology vendors are now working on 1x EVDO Revision A, an improved version of the current 1x EVDO. CDMA operators can migrate to a next-generation all-IP packet network cost-effectively with 1x EVDO Rev A. According to a Lucent Technologies whitepaper, with planned availability in 2006 the 1x EVDO Rev A will drive the maximum data transfer speed from Rev 0's 2.4 Mbps up to 3.1 Mbps. The whitepaper claims that when shared among users in an adequately covered area, this will provide each user with a 330 kbps to 500 kbps experience. Users in optimum conditions can experience up to 1.05 Mbps downlink, which is comparable to the current wireless LANs and domestic fixed-line broadband alternatives. The uplink will be 1.8 Mbps-twelve times faster than the current 1x EVDO Rev 0 rate. A Nortel announcement in March 2005 said that 1x EVDO Rev A will allow service providers to offer feature-rich wireless services such as interactive 3D gaming, mobile music, and a variety of IP services including VoIP and high-speed file transfers. It will also support virtual, real-time interactive access to services such as push-to-talk, mobile television, and video telephony.

Since 2002, 1x EVDO has been deployed and commercially available in networks in countries such as Korea, USA, Brazil, Chile, Czech Republic, Mongolia, Nepal, Guatemala, Israel, and New Zealand. According to the CDMA Development Group, there are 22 1x EVDO commercial networks across Asia, the Americas and Europe, and 20 networks would be deployed in 2005.

Ravi Shekhar Pandey