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Technology Stocks : Samsung and Wireless -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: waitwatchwander who wrote (117)	4/14/2003 4:40:41 PM
From: Eric L	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 374

Open the Kimono (slowly) Trevor, << It sure is amazing the mileage gotten by the "orignal" samsung chip article. Samsung has yet to say boo hoo on the matter. >> Keep em guessing. "Sales and marketing is like uh, well, sex. For best results, open the kimono just a little, then close it a walk away. So the other person can either hanker for more, or not. But in no case would it be kosher to strip down on that first date. That takes all the fun out of it for the other person." Not every company lives and dies by press releases udderred 3 years in advance of whole product delivery, and not every company rips their kimono open in one quick movement, or outlines their whole business sand development strategy in whitepapers for their adoring fans. Samsung was directly quoted in the 1st article I saw on this last September, and most analysts that closely follow handsets have been aware that the handset model with Samsung's own chipset didn't get into qualification at KTF "as early as October, but it did by end of year. Perry LaForge almost dropped his teeth the first time that Samsung announced their IS-95-A/B chipsets. They did it in the CDG Digevent in spring or summer of 2001. no press release, no, leaks to the media. Kapow. The Digeventis still in the CDG archives. That was all part of the same 3 year project. To make a 1xRTT chipset you first have to master IS-95-A/B for forward, backward compatability. In some countries you can possibly get by without IS-95B but you can't in Korea or Hong Kong. I seriously doubt that the Korea IT News made up this "high-ranking official" of Samsung Samsung Electronics embarked on developing 3G original chip (project name: SCom 5000) in 2000 and commercialized it in three years, it announced on Mar. 31. A high-ranking official of the company said: "We will begin the distribution of mobile phone terminals that adopted cdma2000 1x chip independently developed to KTF within the month. The 3G chip is likely to be used not only in domestic but also export models." But Qualcomm says its just a negotiating ploy and they claim that Samsung has produced a few hundred thousand IS-95-A/B chips and Samsung evidently seems to think its closer to a million. Best, - Eric -

To: waitwatchwander who wrote (117)	4/14/2003 5:09:38 PM
From: Eric L	Respond to of 374

The WSJ 1xRTT Article, courtesy of the Toronto Star >> Samsung to Make Its Own Cell Chips David Pringle Seoul Wall Street Journal Apr. 14, 2003 thestar.com The world's third-largest mobile-phone maker, Samsung Electronics Co., is taking steps to become less dependent on Qualcomm Inc. for semiconductors. Samsung, based in South Korea, has been using chips from San Diego's Qualcomm to make phones compatible with Code Division Multiple Access 2000 mobile-phone technology. But it intends to launch a CDMA2000 handset containing its own semiconductors this month in Korea, according to sources close to the situation. CDMA2000 is one of several third-generation mobile-phone technologies designed to let people use their handsets to download video clips and other multimedia applications as well as for talking or sending text messages. Samsung's move echoes the strategy of the world's biggest maker of mobile phones, Nokia of Finland. (U.S.-based Motorola Inc. is the second-largest phone maker in terms of shipments.) If Samsung's CDMA2000 chip can match Qualcomm's chip for performance and price, it could weaken the U.S. company's grip on CDMA technology and vindicate Nokia's much-criticized decision to develop its own CDMA2000 chips. Demand for CDMA2000 handsets, which accounted for about 9 per cent of the global mobile-phone market last year, has been growing rapidly in Japan, Korea and the United States. Don Schrock, group vice president for Qualcomm's CDMA Technologies, said Samsung used its own chips in a CDMA phone three years ago that it sold in South Korea. He said Samsung sold several hundred thousand of the phones and then stopped production. "Samsung is one of our largest customers, and this has happened before," Schrock said. "This is part of them keeping us on our toes, and we have to stay on our toes, but our relationship with Samsung is excellent." He said Samsung is buying a wide variety of Qualcomm's chips for different types of phones. Research firm Strategy Analytics, of Newton, Mass., said the vast majority of the 40 million CDMA2000 phones shipped last year contained Qualcomm's chips. While CDMA2000 is the leading third-generation technology, analysts expect it to be overtaken eventually by another standard called wideband CDMA, or WCDMA. Qualcomm is pushing into the market for WCDMA chips. Samsung aims to launch a WCDMA phone using Qualcomm's chips this year but also is planning to develop its own WCDMA chips, according to sources. A U.K.-based spokesperson for Samsung declined to comment. Using Qualcomm's chips, Samsung has produced a series of sleek, clamshell phones equipped with colour displays and location-finding capabilities. But the company's long-term strategy is to use its own technology, rather than just make products based on components supplied by others. Analysts are divided on whether Samsung will be able to produce cutting-edge CDMA2000 phones using its own chips. Richard Windsor, an analyst with Nomura in London, doesn't think phones that use Samsung's CDMA2000 chip will be a match for models based on Qualcomm's technology. "I would be very surprised if Samsung has produced a similar chipset with a similar level of functionality," he said. "These things are supposedly incredibly difficult to do." Others said Samsung's strategy makes sense. "They have already got the chip-manufacturing capability, and it would add to what they are already doing in memory chips and displays," said Christopher Ambrosio, an analyst with Strategy Analytics. Some observers believe Samsung may have developed its own CDMA2000 chipset as a negotiating ploy to force Qualcomm to lower the price of its semiconductors. Nokia has been the only major phone maker to design its own CDMA2000 chips, assigning about 1,000 staffers to work on the technology. Many analysts have questioned that strategy as the Finnish company has failed to keep up with Samsung and other companies using Qualcomm's chips. Nokia has been slow to roll out CDMA2000 handsets with colour screens, location-finding technology and other advanced features. << - Eric -