mmeggs, IMT-2000, W-CDMA, B-CDMA, UMTS, 3G, ETSI, ITU, EU, F CDMA, and any other acronyms which aren't cdma2000 are not the dinkum oil. They are a band of political and commercial interests trying to nick off with Qualcomm's intellectual property without paying. That is it, pure and simple. There is no technical merit in their arguments. It is all about scoring the dollars, cutting off cdmaOne at the pass and damaging Qualcomm's business opportunities.
I don't know about the 2000 but guess that it is the year 2000, though 2000MHz is a common frequency for cdmaOne transmissions.
All those acronyms are a big smokescreen designed to conceal the dominance of Qualcomm in cdmaOne patents. Even with licensed patents, Motorola has been unable to produce a chip and handset. Nokia has made a bit of a job of it and has a handset on the market. Without Qualcomm's licence to use their patent portfolio, a competitor would not have a snowball's chance in hell of creating a new CDMA system economically or soon enough.
Meanwhile, while the posturing, threats, demonstration W-CDMA, negotiations and waffling go on, Lucent and others are flat out getting 64 Kbps rates working for cdmaOne and that will take care of most data needs. And heading for cdma2000 as a default standard.
Those 40m Japanese will gradually change to cdmaOne. Gradually meaning over a one or two year period. Handsets are not 'own it a decade' type products.
I agree with you, there are no stupid questions - including those which analysts ask Irwin, though it is fair to say they do not deserve their big salaries when, for $100, they could read my always accurate, prescient posts. With only a little fantasy intertwined.
Irwin has said he will not license any widerband CDMA standard which does not include backward compatibility to existing cdmaOne infrastructure and handsets. Personally, I think he should allow a divergent W-CDMA Ericsson standard, but charge an appropriately higher fee. Say 15% for W-CDMA instead of 10% for cdma2000.
I should hasten to add that nobody other than me seems to think those are reasonable figures to maximize the long run profit to Qualcomm. Royalties around 3% seem to be talked about - absurdly low if you ask me!
I'd run an auction - with 1 licence a month being sold to the highest bidder.
Mqurice |
