From a friend who took good notes of Dr. J's talk during the recent analyst conference:
"On the other hand on GSM, the move to GPRS has been delayed somewhat, probably two or three years from what had been expected, it is a fairly small change, using the same modulation essentially over the air but then provides an always on packet connection. But the standards were not handled too well and it has taken quite awhile to implement but it will move ahead and provide some minimal capability, that is a low data rate and a relatively expensive approach to data but it is an always on connection, so I think it will show for GSM users that there some interest in providing this capability. Now some people are talking about moving to EDGE, particularly here in the US. There are now forecasts I noticed that EDGE would be available next year, in quantity using the GPRS infrastructure approach. What will has to happen there is there has to be a new modulation per timeslot over the air and that allows, theoretically, a significantly higher data rate. One can take 60 Kbits per second per timeslot and multiply it by eight and get up to 480 but in fact one has to worry about two things, you have to put some coding to handle data so that number is probably similar to the number that was originally quoted for GPRS, somewhat over 100 kilobits per second. In fact I think we will be seeing something like thirty kilobits per second per timeslot, using all eight timeslots is not particularly economic so you will probably see something like 240 kilobits per second except for one other problem. Ant that is that the coverage of this advanced modulation is less that you can achieve presently with GSM and so either you add some more base stations or you accept a lower data rate. The other problem is that for susceptible to interference, so that the frequency reuse patterns are in question. Well, you might say that all this has been well tested and everybody knows exactly what those numbers are, I hope somebody does, but it is not quite clear yet. Some people are saying however that they have made their first data call using EDGE. So people are committed to moving ahead on it. I think they may have been oversold on A: the time for availability and B: the data rates that will be supported. Probably see the economics but we shall see. The other folks moving further forward for GSM is going to WCDMA, Work is still moving ahead quite rapidly on standards and the 99 standard should be complete one of these days soon and allow the software to be completed. That will not be the commercial release, there will be another release that largely incorporates 99 and adds some things to it. So again some folks have said there will substantial numbers of those phones available in 2002, we hope that is correct and that it does launch very rapidly. So everything smiles down very well so that we can have phones with WCDMA, GPRS maybe even EDGE in this coming year. I am a little skeptical, I have been quoted that a more realist schedule is 2004 - 2005 for substantial numbers of phones and again I hope that turns out to be wrong. But it is a fairly complicated evolution moving from a GSM TDMA system over to WCDMA, which is a CDMA system with a much wider bandwidth, whole new technology to master and, of course, new spectrum because of the wider bandwidth."
Also, Don S received a call on his WCDMA phone during his presentation and put the audio on the sound system. Right out in the light of day rather than just some press release (trust us) like some unnamed groups.
BTW, I was very happy they found a way to spread out the license fees over several years rather than just big lumps every now and then. |
