The WiMAX Forum said today it is opening its first interoperability and testing lab in the U.S. to complement its facilities in Europe and Asia. AT4, the engineering group that runs the Forum’s validation testing in Spain, is scouting several locations near Reston, Va., which would put the facility right next to Sprint’s own WiMAX research and development facilities.

Ed Agis, chairman of the Forum’s certification working group, said the testbed profiles will still be designed by AT4 in the Cetecom Labs in Malaga, Spain, but they would then be exported to the satellite testing facilities in the U.S., Taiwan and later in China. Vendors can certify their equipment from any of the facilities, allowing vendors to get their equipment tested much closer to home and in the markets where they will deployed.

“We were getting a lot of demand and pressure to open a lab in the U.S.,” Agis said. “But we also wanted to make sure we kept the very rigorous requirements we have in Spain.”

Locating the lab in Reston or nearby would place it in the heart of Mobile WiMAX activity in the U.S. Sprint is requiring its primary infrastructure vendors Motorola, Samsung and Nokia to co-locate it with its network engineering staff in Reston, allowing Sprint to perform its own interoperability and compliance testing. The lab will also be near Washington, D.C., where Samsung is building its trial network.