<font color=green>Launch of IS-95C 2.5G mobile service seen being delayed in Korea. Will much maligned GPRS beat out Qualcomm's 2.5G standard to market? The odds maker here says yes!
koreaherald.co.kr
With the third generation (3G) mobile service likely to be delayed, telecom carriers are pinning their hopes on an interim technology that will speed up networks and plug the gap before it takes off.
But concerns are growing that the 2.5G service is also a bit farther down the road than hoped.
Mobile phone makers are delaying the rollout of high-end terminals that support the IS-95C, a standard for seamless mobile Internet and data transmission, much faster than that of current handsets.
Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics had planned to release the new models early this year, but they are pushing back the schedule due to technological complexities and questions about future demand.
Samsung has recently unveiled new mobile phones with a larger LCD panel, which can send data faster than dial-up modems and carry short message services, but still fall short of the speed and capacity promised.
LGE also provided telecom carriers with new models upgraded with Qualcomm's chip, which processes data faster, but these still cannot power 2.5G services like exchanges of video clips on the go.
The 2.5G network, evolved from the current CDMA wireless technology, is promised to provide sophisticated services such as video conferencing, sending high-volume data like music and video, and even having remote control over home appliances, all via mobile phones and handheld organizers.
Makers of handheld computers, a competing personal terminal, are also hesitant in bringing to the market products compatible with the fledgling wireless standard.
Rather, personal digital assistant (PDA) makers are focusing on products which offer more diverse wireless functions on the current second-generation frequency.
Cesscom expects to make a debut of 2.5G-compatible products around the end of the year and Cyber Bank, another PDA maker, believes such devices will be available early next year.
At the heart of the delay lie technological problems and growing doubts about whether and when the market will take off.
"Chips, software and battery capacity should be increased to support video, but the current level of technology falls far beneath what is needed," says an LGE official.
The company's new model used Qualcomm's MSM5000 chip, which can turbo-charge the data transmission at a rate of 144 Kbps, while a perfect video service needs 384 Kbps.
To develop such powerful models, a massive investment in hardware and software is needed. But gear makers are doubtful whether the investment will pay off.
The concern is especially serious among PDA makers, which unlike the electronics giants, are mostly small technology start-ups.
They blame vacilations in the telecom carriers about their plans to deploy the 2.5 service. In addition there is still no guarantee of the quality of networks which they are laying for the super-fast mobile Web connection.
Just two months ago, mobile carriers trumpeted their latest developments in preparing for the 2.5G service and speeding up their upgrade of networks. The bridging technology will be a testing bed for the next stage of their competition.
But the picture is quite different now.
SK Telecom (SKT), the largest mobile service firm in Korea, has recently cancelled its demonstration of the video on demand service after it obtained information that Korea Telecom Freetel will hold a similar event.
Last week. KT Freetel, a subsidiary of state-run Korea Telecom, announced that it will launch a full-fledged IS95C service this month. The announcement was supposed to prod its competitors to follow suit, but there were no such responses.
"We are not going to hurry the schedule before we get confident the system's stability and the demand volume," said an LG Telecom official.
Telecom carriers remain committed to the rollout of a 2.5G service, saying that they are ready to move into the commercial stage. But there are concerns over whether they can offer a network capacity meeting their promised standards.
SKT has repeatedly stressed their capability to offer services this month. But industry sources say the company has yet to complete upgrading their networks across the nation besides some 90 percent in Seoul and its outskirts and part of Taejon. The company has also to reduce its market share, a condition laid by the government for its merger with small carrier Shinsegi Telecomm.
LGT and Freetel said they have completed the 2.5G networks, but there are still unsolved problems in many areas.
A payment system for contents offered on the 2.5G networks has not been resolved. Software still cannot facilitate video conferencing, the most important service to be made possible by the advanced networks.
Their network has also not been proven capable of running data at promised speeds. Unlike voice calls, IS-95C's capacity can be tested when data traffic reaches a certain amount, which it has not a yet.
"Early users may be test bed for their networks," said an industry source. |
