Nokia Outlines Third Way for 3G

[amphibian]

http://www.newscuts.com/cgi-bin/read...e.pl?t54158658

Nokia Outlines Third Way for 3G

(09/12/2002, BWCS Staff) Nokia is developing a new 3G standard which will enable the two major competing next-generation standards, W-CDMA and cdma2000, to interoperate. The new technology, called Global W-CDMA is primarily targeted at the US market where the leading operators are split between the cdma2000 and W-CDMA paths to 3G.

G-WCDMA is designed to operate in new tranches of spectrum which are due to be auctioned in the US in 2004. Nokia claims that G-WCDMA is nearing standardisation and will be made commercially available to coincide with the US spectrum awards.

Although versions of W-CDMA (backed by Nokia) have been adopted across Europe and parts of the Asia-Pacific and US, in terms of actual deployments cdma2000 (pushed by Qualcomm) has established a significant lead. By the end of October cdma2000 had been rolled out on 27 mobile networks worldwide while NTT DoCoMo remained the only operator offering W-CDMA on a mass-market commercial basis.

According to the CDMA Development Group there were 25.43 million cdma2000 subscribers worldwide by 31 October with new customers being added at a rate of two million per month. DoCoMo by contrast had 142,400 W-CDMA customers at the same date and is adding around 6,000 customers per month. As European W-CDMA networks gradually come online from 2003 onwards this disparity will undoubtedly diminish but it now seems at a much slower rate than previously anticipated.

While debates about what should and shouldn’t be classified as 3G continue, it is clear that Nokia and others recognise that interoperability between these two technologies is becoming increasingly vital to the success of next-generation services. This issue will be especially significant in markets such as the US and Japan where W-CDMA and cdma2000 operate side by side.

[frail47]

IMHO W-CDMA is a failure and is something that will probably never be achieved in the US. A better option is something that's under testing right now, GSM1x, where there's still a core GSM voice system but a 1x data system. We shall see...

[Kenster]

If you can't beat'em! Join'em!