Raymond, you got it the wrong way around. Ericsson wants to change cdma2000 to be like GSM, but with the specific intent of writing off cdmaOne for anticompetitive, anticonsumer, market dominance reasons. There is no W-CDMA, just W-CDMA-VW and cdma2000. Take your pick on which to back.
Free trade includes paying for use of somebody else's patents. It doesn't mean everything is free. That's the idea that you seem to put on it. Would you please quote a single instance of Qualcomm whining. The whining is coming from Koreans complaining about the price of patents which they were happy to agree to pay to use. It is coming from Nokia, Ericsson and those who want a freeloader's lunch, whining that Qualcomm is wanting payment.
This is not about the USA dominating. It is about international agreements on ownership of patents. Fortunately, if international criminals abuse patent agreements, the USA is in a position to punish the criminals. If Ericsson chooses to be a criminal, then their assets will be confiscated. Pretty simple and straightforward really. They just need to hire a patent lawyer or two for explanations on international patent law.
You are quite right, the market will decide. They decided cdmaOne was the way to go and GSM is an obsolete technology. Ericsson agrees. So does everyone else. They will likewise decide that cdma2000 is the way to go. Of course, Ericsson can fall another 3 years behind by being obtuse.
You ask, "Why should companys like NOKIA and Ericsson that will have the heavy job to to do this standardization do the extra work to adopt it to both IS-41 and GSM?"[sic] Quite simply, because Qualcomm owns the patents. If you want to buy use of the IPR, then you agree to the demands. If you don't want to buy, then you build your own sandpit to play in. If Qualcomm makes absurd technical demands, Ericsson and other heavy lifters will abandon cmda2000 and go with Interdigital's efforts, or invent their own, or stick with GSM, or go out of business, or be taken over by Qualcomm or whatever.
Please enlighten us on what you think "free-trade" means Raymond.
I do like the idea of charging use of cdma2000 according to the bits per second transmitted. That would make the IPR price higher, not lower - and since customers get more bits for their dollar, that is a good deal for them. After all, it's bits they want, not ASICS.
If it's impossible to adapt GSM to cdma2000, then I guess all the rusty old GSM systems are heading for the tip. Bad luck eh. I hope there aren't any prospective GSM customers getting ready to sign up for some dud technology which they'll have to ditch in a short time. They should go with cdmaOne now, with backward compatibility guaranteed by the USA.
Better that than a GSM system, with no backward compatibility from cdma2000, with no W-CDMA-VW compatibility in the next 5 years or maybe 10, backed by a European Commission which couldn't organize a piss-up in a brewery.
Mqurice
WARNING WARNING WARNING WARNING WARNING
TO ALL GSM CUSTOMERS!! CANCEL ORDERS NOW. YOUR SYSTEM WILL HAVE NO CDMA FUTURE THE WAY ERICSSON, NOKIA AND YETIS ARE GOING. QUALCOMM HAS THE ONLY MECHANISM AVAILABLE TO BE CDMA2000 COMPATIBLE.
PS: It's amazing how times have changed from a couple of years ago when Bill Frezza and Ericsson were warning all and sundry that IS-95 would be stillborn. |
