Delays in 3G roll-out feared...
"Most of the show speakers were not promising a near-term market–or even a smooth transition to 3G."
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Don’t Hold Your Breath Waiting For 3G
By Peggy Albright
CHICAGO—Like most wireless data and third-generation technology events held around the country this past year, the meeting room at last week’s PCIA GlobalXChange was filled to the brim with attendees–hundreds, if not thousands, who have not yet seen a wireless trade show.
But those hoping to get rich quick may be wondering what all the 3G hype is about. Most of the show speakers were not promising a near-term market–or even a smooth transition to 3G.
“I worry as we move from 2G to 3G that things may get worse before they get better,” says Carl Northrop, a partner and head of the telecom law practice of Paul Hasting Janofsky & Walter in Washington, D.C.
Northrop predicts there won’t be enough spectrum to meet 3G needs, especially in the United States where designated frequencies already are encumbered by other technologies. But the grounds for his grim view don’t end there. He says this past summer’s specification of multiple, additional 3G frequencies by the World Radiocommunication Conference will undermine the ability of carriers in the United States to efficiently migrate to 3G. And some major carriers still lack complete 2G footprints and will have to look to forthcoming auctions to fill in major coverage gaps. The new SBC Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp. wireless venture, for example, has no coverage in New York City. The carriers will need to look to forthcoming auctions to fill in the gap, regardless of new bandwidth’s suitability for 3G.
Despite Northrop’s pessimistic perspective, the FCC still believes the deregulated approach used in the United States–which has led to multiple technologies–is better, in the long run, than the European model that required uniform technologies.
If the United States had followed the European approach and selected a technology in the mid-’90s, it likely would have selected TDMA, suggests Bryan Tramont, advisor to FCC Commissioner Harold Furchtgott-Roth.
Anticipated spectrum auctions, such as the move to free up channels 60-69 and the C-Block re-auction, will help companies evolve to 3G, Tramont says. But even then, other panelists were not hopeful that the 60-69 bands held by the broadcasting industry would ever become available because that industry wields so much influence in Washington.
“We in the wireless industry have nothing that compares to that sort of economic power,” says Alan Pearce, president of Information Age Economics.
All this adds up to one mighty hurdle for the wireless industry to overcome. But don’t count out a future transition to 3G–the race has only begun. |
