re: Toshiba & Siemens mobile-phone collaboration
>> Toshiba & Siemens Join Forces
Kristy Bassuener
Wireless Week
November 7, 2001
Japan's Toshiba Corp. and Germany's Siemens' Information and Communication Mobile unit confirmed rumors of mobile-phone collaboration in a statement Siemens issued earlier today. The companies will pursue a global, long-term alliance for the research and development of 3G handsets.
Under the alliance, the companies will combine R&D expertise and resources, aiming to have handsets on store shelves by early next year. The companies will focus on wideband-CDMA phones, but also will pursue other next-generation devices as well as MPEG-4 video terminals, the announcement says.
'Partnering with Siemens... allows us to reinforce our presence and competitiveness in the rapidly growing mobile phone market,' Kaoru Kubo, executive vice president of Toshiba Corp.'s Digital Media Network company, said in the statement. 'By allowing us to integrate the latest advances in W-CDMA and GSM into our products, the global alliance will put us in a position to respond more quickly and effectively to the needs of the 3G mobile phone market.'
The alliance appears to deepen the ties between the two companies -- Toshiba and Siemens announced last year that they would collaborate for handset development. At deadline, it was unclear exactly how today's announcement affects the companies' business relationship. Executives at Siemens and Toshiba were not immediately available for comment. <<
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