Jon:
There are devils and then there are people with different opinions. I think that Bill Frezza was a devil...a person in the employ of Ericsson who held himself out an an objective observer in the CDMA-GSM debate.
I believe that Tero is Finnish rather than Swedish and that we are being somewhat parochial by assuming that any European with a different view from ours is an Ericsson shill. Let's face it. GSM has an excellent network architecture and has been a great success worldwide. I believe it has the wrong air-interface, but even that is changing given Ericsson's move to W-CDMA. This is all about perspectives. If you were an Ericsson shareholder, would you want the company to say "well doggone it, QC's got us by the b..ls, guess we're going to have to turn over our franchise to them?" I do not think so. I think Ericsson played a high stakes game, betting that it could stop CDMA cold...betting that either the technology would not work, would not work well enough, or would not be deployed in time. Unlike Nokia, and other European companies, Ericsson played the game "all-or-nothing" and appears to have come out with the short-end of the stick. The company has shifted gears and is in damage control mode--but we cannot fault people like Tero, who for years heard QC's CDMA portrayed as snake-oil on a stick, for being somewhat skeptical. Who knows..had PrimeCo and Sprint gone with GSM or IS-136 instead of CDMA, Qualcomm may have lacked the customer base and worldwide credibility to get CDMA deployed elsewhere in the world. People's perceptions change slowly, particularly when the beliefs are honestly held and fundamental in nature. Better to educate rather than to vilify.
Best regards,
Gregg |
