Ron,
<< Perry La Forge must have spoken w/ this guy ... Group 3G is considering the deployment of GPRS in the 3G band. >>
LOL! Perry SHOULD have spoken to that guy. <g>
A prime prospect wouldn't you say?
<< I just don't get it...is CDMA2000 a profanity in Europe? >>
No. There are no regulatory impediments to implementing cdma2000 in the spectrum that 3G has license for, although there certainly are time to market issues with cdma2000 in 2GHZ spectrum that don't exist with GPRS. cdma2000 has not yet been commercialized for use in Europe and does not yet begin to deal with issues of interoperability or voice and data roaming requisite for a European carrier. Fast & efficient without other redeeming characteristics just doesn't quite come remotely close to hacking it.
Two days ago ZDNet published an article called "Isolationism?" by Nancy Gohring that dealt with issues of spectrum allocation as they related to global roaming and 3G.
zdnet.com
It elicited a lot of negative comments on the Qualcomm threads. While pretty high level, I personally thought it was a pretty good article.
The article opened with the statement:
"It's time to face the fact that the U.S. won't see third-generation wireless."
Now an opening statement like that is bound to raise some eyebrows from any of us Qualcommers in light of the fact that Verizon, Sprint PCS, Alltel, and Nextel are all committed to implement "3G" in the US starting end of this year or more likely next year.
She went on to state:
"We'll remain on our island in the high-speed, mobile, multimedia network spanning the globe"
That kind of moved into her main thesis that as compared to other nations "we have far less potentially usable spectrum".
That happens to be a fact. Moreover the spectrum we have allocated is not in synch with the spectrum set aside by the WRC for IMT-2000 services. The fact of the matter is that although the dominant digital technology deployed in the US is significantly more spectrally efficient than GPRS (that is being considered for deployment by the carrier you reference) cdma2000 currently is a comparatively weak platform to deal with the issues raised by this Military Officer stationed in Germany who posted a response to the article:
<< I currently live in Germany and this story hits home hard! In 4 months I'll end my 3 year live in Germany and have to face the completely horrid system at home, after having complete freedom over in Europe!
My cell phone works EVERYWHERE in Europe! I fly to Italy it switches to nearest/cheapest service. I go to Macedonia (which is not a very technologically advanced country) and my phone connects up with no problems.
My phone is a piece of work as well.. I can phone, SMS, and web.. all over the place with no problems and my friends always get through to me.
In the states, my sister's new digital phone does good at our house in the city where she bought it! Going to another area serviced by a compactor gives no service or unreliable service. SMS services aren't available and web is a fantasy!
And America is supposed to be the big technology capital!
We have slipped big time! Europe did what they needed to do! while we let BIG companies stall and introduce bad standards that have only served to propel us backwards! Sadly, I'm not looking forward to giving up my technology when I go back home... <<
This post gets to the heart of the issue of why cdma2000 faces significant obstacles for deployment in Europe (and many other regions). Europeans take reasonably priced, fully interoperable, mobile wireless telephony, with region wide (worldwide) roaming and selection of preferred networks for granted. cdma2000 is not yet ready for prime time in this environment.
A cross-modal specification for 1xRTT on a GSM-MAP core exists. I don't think anyone has attempted to commercialize it. No cross-modal specification for 1xEV-DO has been initiated. Even on an AMSI-41 core 1xRTT/1xEV-DO won't be ready for commercial deployment in IMT-2000 spectrum till late 2002, and by then ...
Someday we'll see the "Holy Grail" Nancy Gohring referred to:
"handsets that can operate on any of those networks and switch from one to the other - without the user knowing - based on such criteria as price, signal strength and service offering."
... but that's a few years down the pike.
... hopefully before 4G:
The Wireless World Research Forum - a consortium of leading vendors including Alcatel, Ericsson, Nokia and Siemens - also surfaced recently to work toward developing devices that roam across networks. The group calls this progress fourth-generation, a term that many of us may shudder to even consider in the midst of the current 3G drama.
Yikes, another forum.
- Eric - |
