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To: 49thMIMOMander who wrote (8568)	12/16/2000 2:04:25 AM
From: S100	Respond to of 34857

Seems like they could add Iridium and Globalstar support also with little extra effort during this minor upgrade. After all, they have a very large budget, something like $10 per pop.

To: 49thMIMOMander who wrote (8568)	12/17/2000 5:16:39 PM
From: S100	Respond to of 34857

Spot the Loonie By Jove, I think he has spotted one! Andrew Seybold on ATT Several weeks ago, I speculated on the rumor that ATT wireless might change their technology roadmap and that also, NTT DoCoMo might invest in them. This past week, both of these things happened. Although the changes in their technology roadmap are not going to happen exactly as I suggested. Instead of ATT Wireless announcing that they were changing out their TDMA system in favor of GSM GPRS, the European standard, they added GSM GPRS to their roadmap and they also added wide band CDMA or UMTS, third generation technology as well. The result of adding these two technologies, is that ATT will have the most complex wireless network in existence as they move forward. Picture this, on their 800 Mhz systems they will continue to support analog cellular, as they are required to do by law, use TDMA technology for digital voice services, and continue to support cellular digital packet data for wireless data. On their 1900 Mhz systems, they will augment their existing TDMA voice service with GSM GPRS for voice and data. While they claim that GPRS will permit them to offer 115 Kbits per second data, the reality is that the true data rate will be closer to 30 Kbits per second. So before they even start rolling out their third generation services, they will be supporting three different flavors of voice technology, analog, TDMA and GSM, and two different types of data access, CDPD and GPRS. From here on out, it really gets messy. Moving toward third generation services, they have chosen to continue to try to deploy a technology called EDGE, which I understand may not even be viable. And also overlay Wide Band CDMA or UMTS 2000. If they actually deploy all these technologies, they will then be supporting five different voice technologies and four different data technologies. And they are promoting this roadmap as a clean migration path to the future? I have to ask myself, how they could possibly have come up this system design. It is the most complex mix of wireless technologies ever proposed and the costs to implement all of this will be higher for both ATT and the consumer. Handset vendors are going to have a hard time trying to figure out what types of devices to build, and customers are going to have to understand in which markets each of the various technologies are available and when. Consumers are going to have to trade out their handsets at least once, if not up to three times as this network evolves. If, as I believe that EDGE never sees the light of day, then the design of the network becomes somewhat more realistic, but it will still be made up of four different voice technologies and three data modes. The question is how did they ever dream up this design? The answer is that they are trying to please many different groups of folks. For NTT DoCoMo's billions, they have agreed to move to Wide Band CDMA for their generation network, because that is what NTT DoCoMo wants to have happen. ATT wireless is going to also be working with NTT DoCoMo to deploy the very successful I-Mode wireless Internet access, which is one of the reasons they have chosen GSM GPRS. NTT DoCoMo's infusion of almost $10 Billion for16 per cent of the company, will please Wall Street, as well as faster deployment of third generation technology. And TDMA and EDGE were left in the mix to appease the rest of the TDMA carriers, who would be left in the lurch, if the largest TDMA carrier in the world walked away from it. So ATT Wireless has devised a plan that is all things to all people, except in all of this, they seem to have forgotten the customer. The customer, who is going to have to pay more for their phones, the customer who is going to have to trade up to new phones several times, and the customer, who will not have as many choices when it comes to wireless devices on the ATT network as they will on networks with fewer technologies. ATT's competitors should be heaving a sigh of relief. Instead of forcing some of them to follow in ATT's footprint, they will be able to concentrate instead on their own technology course, and perhaps, on picking up some number of ATT's customers as well. For ABC news.com this is Andy Seybold. Jolly good job, old chap. Well done.