Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

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

To: foundation who wrote (31671)	1/24/2003 3:25:59 PM
From: foundation	Respond to of 197225

3G Go Slow ----- Unstrung 01.24.03 Remember when UMTS was going to give us 2 Mbit/s? That was back in the megahype days of 2000. Since then, the data rates quoted have dropped lower and lower. And lower. Now, service providers are talking about UMTS networks that will deliver -- wait for it - - "speeds" of 100 kbit/s or less. Borrrring! Insight into one of the main reasons for the ever-decreasing bandwidth promises was delivered to Unstrung today by Mark Pittick, marketing director at wireless network vendor startup IPWireless Inc. (which sounds kinda nasty, when you think about that name too long). Pittick used to be at Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT - message board) in the days when it was still taken seriously as a potential UMTS system provider. "We did a study for Vodafone Group plc [NYSE: VOD] to see what it would take to build a network dense enough to provide 384 kbit/s nationwide in the U.K.," says Marky Mark. "We figured it would take about 50,000 base stations and cost $10 billion to roll out. That's one reason why it's starting out at about 80 kbit/s." Just $10 billion? Surely that's nothing to a man of Sir Christopher Gent's wallet power (see Gent's Golden Shower). — Ray Le Maistre, European Editor, Unstrung unstrung.com ========== Can commercial UMTS compete with 1x performance? This becomes a very sober, very real question. And 1x wins the capacity competition hands down. MOT's study would have occurred before concerns came to light regarding low-functioning cell station amplifiers... that grew from real-world experience with the wCDMA infra build and testing. In this light, by what factor are MOT's old projections too optimistic? LOL! What a hole they've dug for themselves. If IJ is correct, and commercial use is possible by late 04, will it matter? Barring generational technology leaps by failure-prone 3GSM vendors, does UMTSwCDMA coverage and capacity offer a financially rational proposition? Sadly, IJ has never fielded that question.