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Technology Stocks : The New Qualcomm - a S&P500 company -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: JGoren who wrote (6078)	2/1/2000 8:53:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 13582

2/01/00 - KOREAN MOBILE PHONE MAKERS BID FOR CHINA CDMA TENDERS Feb 01, 2000 (AsiaPulse via COMTEX) -- SEOUL, Feb 2 Asia Pulse - Korean mobile phone makers are confident of being included on a list of prime candidates for the first major project to commercialize CDMA wireless technology in China. The China United Telecommunications Corp. (China Unicom) received tenders last November from 13 companies, including Samsung, Hyundai and LG, for the world's largest-scale CDMA project to construct four million cables in the latter half of this year. China's second-largest telecoms company was to announce three to four prime bidders by early this year, but the decision was being delayed due to the complicated procedure of receiving government approval, sources close to the situation say. But government and industry sources expect the project will pick up speed once Qualcomm finalizes deals with China Unicom over adopting the CDMA mode. Qualcomm, which holds patents to most CDMA technology, is engaged in last-minute negotiations with Unicom over licensing royalties. China is demanding lower licensing fees in return for opening the market to CDMA technology. China currently uses the GSM standard prevalent in Europe. The country had 43 million mobile phone users last year and the figure is expected to jump to 70 million this year. China is the most important market for telecommunications companies worldwide because its choice between CDMA and GSM technology can also determine which mode it will use for the IMT-2000. Foreign reports say Qualcomm and China Unicom are close to a deal with the latter in the race to catch up with China Telecom, which dominates the Chinese wireless market with the GSM standard. Once the CDMA patent holder signs a deal to adopt CDMA technology, the latter can go on with the infrastructure project. Government sources say Korean companies have a good chance of in winning in Unicom's first bidding. Samsung, Hyundai, LG are vying with Motorola, Lucent Technologies, Notel, Ericsson, NEC, Fujitsu and four Chinese companies for the country's largest-ever supply contract. "The Chinese have a good impression about Korean CDMA phones and technology. We hear all three Korean companies have received high ratings and expect at least one or two will be included among the three to four finalists," said Chung Jin-kwan, an official of the Information and Communications Ministry. Korea, which was first in the world to commercialize CDMA technology, has 60 percent of the 33.6 million CDMA phone users worldwide. Noh Joon-hyung, head of the ministry's international affairs department, visited China with former Finance and Economy Minister Kang Bong-kyun last month and had "deep" talks with senior executives of China Unicom, Chung said. The government has made a concerted effort to help Korean phone makers gain the upper hand in the Chinese market since Beijing decided to introduce CDMA technology in April last year. After many working-level talks, Information and Communications Minister Namgoong Suek and Wu Zichuan, Chinese minister for information technology, and Telecom Industries signed a memorandum in May to set up a working group to study CDMA technology and cooperate in commercializing it in China. The government spoke on behalf of the Korean CDMA industry during meetings with presidents, foreign ministers and finance ministers of the two countries last year. "We think our efforts will produce results," Chung said. The industry is also relaxed, in that it acted relatively quicker in advancing into the Chinese market than other global rivals. Samsung, which was first to introduce CDMA technology in China, supplied equipment when the CDMA service was tested in Beijing and Tianjin in 1998. It was also first to start commercial service, together with Hebei Century Mobile Communication, from this month in Hebei, China. LG Information and Communications last month set up a joint venture telecom company LG-TOPS with China's GPTE and GTAST to sell wireless local loop (WLL) system based on CDMA technology. "The most important thing right now is to make the CDMA technology known in China," says Yoon Jong-jin, a spokesman for Samsung Electronics. "The competition is good. We should have Qualcomm, Motorola and many more others in the market competing with CDMA mode. We need to make the market big first of all in order to compete." Samsung and other Korean companies can gain more from a bigger Chinese market because they have worked hard to make their brands known, he said. According to a 1998 survey by Dataquest, a U.S.-based Internet research firm, Samsung took up 28.5 percent of the CDMA handset market with sales of 17 million units. LG accounted for 18.1 percent and Hyundai 10.3 percent. (Yonhap) Note: not one mention of Nokia.