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: Jim Mullens who wrote (39059)	2/1/2004 8:10:25 PM
From: pyslent	Respond to of 197031

How about Brian Modoff’s research report finding on AWE’s deployment cost?- I'm not familiar with Modoff's pricing models and what his assumptions are (is it build up from scratch, or build up from AT&T's wCDMA-ready GSM base-stations?), so I'm not comfortable commenting on their validity. Do you have any documentation to refute his numbers? None, other than AWE's public projections of 1.5B for a nationwide network.

To: Jim Mullens who wrote (39059)	2/2/2004 12:54:31 AM
From: slacker711	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197031

How about Brian Modoff’s research report finding on AWE’s deployment cost?- “what do you get for $1.5B”, etc). Granted, its somewhat dated and with the telecom depression costs have come down, but his numbers are still huge. Do you have any documentation to refute his numbers? Let's throw around some numbers... AWE has already built out its GSM-MAP infrastructure which will remain the same for W-CDMA. The GSM network is at 1900MHz which is also where the W-CDMA will be placed....so they have already obtained most of the base stations sites that will be needed. Antennas, power, and bandwidth should all be in place for these sites. So, most of the cost of the upgrade is going to be in the price of the base stations themselves. Note that I am assuming that an entirely new base station is needed and that you cant get away with a new transceiver (as some of the newer GSM base stations seem to imply). Let's estimate about 20,000 base stations for a nationwide network (about what PCS currently has). I have read in multiple locations that the price of a W-CDMA base stations has actually dropped below the price of a GSM base station. I dont have access to GSM or W-CDMA base station prices (anybody have access to that info?)....but I have read other people estimate that the price is now well below $100,000. I think you can pretty much see where this is going....if I use a range of $50,000 to $100,000 for the price of the base stations, you end up with an upgrade cost of $1 to $2 billion. There are obviously some other ancillary costs including the cost to put in new base stations. Overall though the AWE estimate doesnt look to far out of line. The key is that AWE already has the 1900MHz sites and the fact that W-CDMA base station prices have fallen so substantially over the years. Slacker

To: Jim Mullens who wrote (39059)	2/2/2004 1:19:51 PM
From: pyslent	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197031

How about Brian Modoff’s research report finding on AWE’s deployment cost?- “what do you get for $1.5B”, etc). I dug around and found the report myself... base-earth.com Without giving it too close a read, my first impression is that he committed a blunder akin to when he apparently compared class 10 GPRS with class 2 EDGE (still looking for that STN report :) ). "Our forecast is only for the radio access network (RAN) and the core network. If you scoll down to the bottom of the 2002 report, you reach the area that you've repeatedly quoted. In the figures, the stacked bar graphs show the CAPEX requirements for WCDMA broken down into two components: the RAN and the Core network (incidentally, Figs 11 and 12 have the color codings for RAN and CORE switched compared to Figs 8-9). If you take the data at face value, it appears to suggest that Modoff's "analysis" assumes a build up of WDCMA from scratch (without an operational GSM base), and is therfore anywhere from 10-80% overestimated (by eyeballing the relative capex of CN and RAN on the charts). At best, this report is an honest mistake; at worst, it's FUD. Coupled with the EDGE vs. GPRS "comparision," I'd consider Modoff's credibility somewhat questionable. Good find though on the QCOM white paper on GSM1X. If a 1X basestation is $160,000 (for ReleaseA and no DO), and the comparable wCDMA basestation is ~$100,000, it looks like the price of GSM1X and wCDMA are in the same ballbark (for the same spectrum), and the decision will come down to what spectrum the operator has available. If they want to use 3G spectrum at 2100 MHz, then wCDMA seems like the natural choice. Unfortunately for GSM1X prospects (IMO), if a GSM operator has to use existing spectrum, then EDGE is pretty compelling at around 1/10 the cost of GSM1X (although it does not increase capacity). And then there's always downbanded wCDMA as a potential competitor... Anyway, getting back to the original discussion, which revolved around GSM/1X dual mode handsets, I believe ... :)