<Until CDG learns to spell W-CDMA they will probably continue to sit all alone, all by themselves, over in 3GPP2, reminiscing about how carriers could have saved themselves a lot of money by attempting to implement 3G like services in highly constrained and exhaustible spectrum, while the 3GPP Global Initiative (2.5G existing spectrum & 3G, new - with some existing spectrum) marches forward.>
Eric, Those hyphens are more slippery than apostrophe's. The 3GSM 'up is down and GSM is 3G' Alice In Wonderland crowd calls W-CDMA "3GSM" in a perverse attempt to pretend that it is a GSM system and the world is rolling on unchanged. When the GSM Guild [GG] learns to spell 3G-like, maybe they will decide that if highly constrained and exhaustible spectrum can be made to squeeze 3G-like services through via 1xEV, then that is obviously a good thing.
We have all learned via the 3G auctions in several countries just how valuable spectrum is. Therefore, it is great news that QUALCOMM has enabled 3G-like services to be offered in the old, exhaustible and constrained spectrum, which will turn a muddy cattle track into a 6-lane, high-speed highway. Squeezing a lot more through the existing cattle-track is cheaper than buying huge swathes of new real estate preparatory to building an all-new system.
Given the success so far of the Koreans in their claim that they were owed royalties on "PCS" as well as "cellular" band sales, perhaps Nokia is hoping that they can parlay their old agreements from 1990 when CDMA was just getting going, into a full-blown 3G licence, without having to pay the current rate, just as Motorola recently got an agreement to continue paying their low royalties which stemmed from the 1990 [or thereabouts] licensing agreement with QUALCOMM.
Nokia plans to be big time in CDMA. They had better get moving. Maybe if they help squeeze 3G-like services down cattle-tracks, they will find another big market and make a lot more money. If they persist with Alice In Wonderland 3GSM VW-40 systems, they are likely to go down the gurgler when everyone realizes that Nokia is weak in Cattle-Track CDMA, cdma2000, 1xEV and 3G CDMA systems of whatever fancy new acronym are ALL CDMA and ALL will involve 5% royalties to QUALCOMM [or the same royalty rate as cdmaOne licences, whichever is the more accurate] in ADDITION to whatever the Greed Guild [GG] charges. When people realize that GSM airwaves are obsolete and 3GSM is NOT GSM and that Nokia has foolishly kept off the cattle-track and has avoided getting a licence and GSM subscriber sales are dropping rapidly in favour of CDMA 3G services, of which Nokia will probably have a small share, [there being about 60 CDMA subscriber device licensees], there will be a stampede for the exits - Nokia's share price would crash.
Nokia is playing a very dangerous game - extending GSM and holding W-CDMA back as long as possible with endless dickering in stupid bureauratic standards jamborees while refraining from getting a licence from Q! and hoping that they get their switcheroo timing just right. So far, so good. They better keep their fingers crossed.
The pressure is building on the 3G service providers who have bid big on spectrum and also own a bunch of cattle-tracks which can fit a LOT more traffic on them with the 3G-like services. The fact that they bid big doesn't change the value of 3G services and what they can charge. It doesn't mean they can defer rolling it out until the demand is proven. They have got to get going. If they have blown their dough with big bids on spectrum for which there is little demand, they won't avoid the loss by delaying or charging too much.
The pressure is on in a lot of directions. Nokia is holding the line. The service providers must be getting edgy [not EDGEy]. The sprint for the finish line will start any time - as soon as one makes a break, they'll all have to get going in pursuit, just like those bike-racers at the Olympics, where they do that slow pedalling for a while until all of a sudden it's all on and they go like hell. Nobody wants to be first to go but they sure don't want to be last.
Nokia needs to get their CDMA gadgets all in a row as fast as possible, ready to go like hell when it's time. Playing acronym games like '3GSM' is pathetic. 3G is NOT GSM [which was Group Speciale Mobile, now sneakily revamped to Global System 4 Mobile to make it look universal which it is not.]
Mqurice |
