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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Moderated Thread - please read rules before posting -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: foundation who wrote (3629)	10/11/2000 1:06:00 PM
From: LJM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 196986

By Reed Stevenson TOKYO, Oct 11 (Reuters) - Japan's leading wireless carrier NTT DoCoMo Inc <9437.T>, hoping to keep the momentum going in its global expansion plans, said on Wednesday it would consider spending more money in Europe and eventually list its shares overseas. NTT DoCoMo President and Chief Executive Keiji Tachikawa told Reuters that his company may buy additional shares in European partner KPN Mobile at its upcoming initial public offering in order to maintain its 15 percent stake. "It depends on how they conduct their IPO. If it's current share issues, there's no problem (with our stake) but if it involves new shares, we will consider it (buying more)," Tachikawa told Reuters in an interview. Dutch KPN Telecom NV <KPN.N> has said it will take its wireless unit, which DoCoMo considers the cornerstone of its European expansion strategy, public through a new share offering. NTT DoCoMo, which has more than 12 million users surfing the Web on its Internet-enabled "i-mode" phones, is hoping to build on that success when it launches third generation (3G) mobile services next May. DoCoMo will be the first wireless carrier to offer 3G services, which will be able to deliver video and CD-quality sound over connections more than five times faster than current speeds. DoCoMo hopes to deliver such services globally first, making it the focus of intense scrutiny over whether additional equity will be issued to fund its global expansion plans. GLOBAL PLAYER Tachikawa stressed that a global offering, probably in the London and New York markets, was not likely before the end of the next business year, which ends on March 31, 2002. He explained that intense preparation was needed to modify its accounting system to meet strict Securities and Exchange Commission rules. "The reason why we are considering this is to increase liquidity in our shares," Tachikawa said. He explained that of the 32.9 percent of DoCoMo's shares notheld by its parent, former state monopoly Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) Corp <9432.T>, 13 percent were held by foreign investors. "It's wrong that you can only buy our shares in the Tokyo market. Therefore, if the conditions are right, we can do this (global offering)." While Tachikawa was careful to hedge his remarks by saying that an offering was still far off, he also added that if the company needed funding badly, they were capable of doing an offering earlier if necessary. "We will just put more resources into it." U.S. STILL A GAP Such funding needs would arise if DoCoMo were to cement an alliance with another partner, particularly in the United States, the world's biggest telecoms market, where it has yet to gain a foothold. "We think that the United States is an attractive market for us. Tying up with an operator that is likely to adopt the W-CDMA standard is better for our long term purposes," Tachikawa said. Tachikawa declined to confirm whether discussions with U.S. carriers BellSouth Corp <BLS.N> and SBC Communications Inc <SBC.N> were taking place. He did hint, however, that any deal involving the two companies, which will create the number two wireless company in the United States, would not happen until well into 2001. "They (SBC and BellSouth) are concentrating on their merger right now. Even if they aim for the fall it will likely be completed next year. Until that happens, it's unlikely that they can take the next step," Tachikawa said. ASIA ALSO A HURDLE On DoCoMo's Asia plans, Tachikawa acknowledged that expansion was more difficult because of the more fragmented markets spread across Asia, separated by national regulatory hurdles. Tachikawa said that DoCoMo would be willing to work with China Mobile Communications Corp if it were approached. "We have already done a lot with China Mobile (Communications Corp), and have already conducted technical experiments with them," Tachikawa said. China also promises to be potentially lucrative market for wireless businesses, with its huge population that is already projected to have some 72 million wireless users by year-end. Britain's giant wireless carrier Vodafone Plc <VOD.L> DoCoMo's biggest rival on the global stage, inked a deal last week with China Mobile (Hong Kong) Ltd <0941.HK>, the Hong Kong unit of China Mobile Communications Corp The problem with expanding DoCoMo's business into Korea, Tachikawa said, was the country's inability to decide on a standard for 3G services. South Korea's government is pushing its telecoms sector to accept both of two competing platforms be adopted for 3G phones instead of letting companies choose on their own. The nation's three top carriers have all balked at adopting cdma2000 in favour of W-CDMA, an evolution of the GSM standard that now holds 70 percent of the world market. W-CDMA (wideband code division multiple access) is the system that DoCoMo has chosen for its 3G services set to begin in nearly six months. W-CDMA is being developed by Nokia <NOK1V.HE> and Ericsson <LMEb.ST>, competes with Qualcomm's <QCOM.O> cdma2000. "We'd like them to just decide (on a standard)," Tachikawa said. REUTERS Rtr 09:23 10-11-00 //Begin Meta Data// Selector Code: reutr Copyright 2000, Reuters News Service

To: foundation who wrote (3629)	10/11/2000 4:05:27 PM
From: Art Bechhoefer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 196986

Ben, of course, those service providers who upgrade to CDMA2000 will do it as soon as they can in order to get a competitive edge in terms of the kinds of data access they can provide. But what I was getting at is the other service providers who might consider upgrading to WCDMA will try their best to DO NOTHING, that being the lowest cost alternative, as long as they can get away with it. They spent so much money on new spectrum that I'm sure they'd prefer waiting a while before spending more on upgrading their systems to WCDMA. All they have to do is keep advertising that the current GSM and its limited data access capability is good enough for the average consumer, who doesn't have the technical background to understand why there's something better out there. As a way of buttressing this argument, I would point out the current advertising of AT&T wireless services. It sounds like you can do anything you need to do with this system. You can call anywhere, you can get stock quotes, you can browse other Internet sites, and gee, it doesn't even cost all that much! So much for the advertising. The reality is a little different. Art