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: slacker711 who wrote (52985)	6/30/2006 10:39:04 AM
From: ROBERT H RICHMOND	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197001

Could it be a paid off bias by Indian officials toward GSM?

To: slacker711 who wrote (52985)	6/30/2006 11:16:06 AM
From: carranza2	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197001

Perhaps it is the quality of carrier service which to blame. Reputation counts a lot. Who knows. But with the kind of market advantage you have shown exists, I should think that the anomaly will eventually correct in favor of CDMA.

To: slacker711 who wrote (52985)	6/30/2006 11:35:22 AM
From: manalagi	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 197001

Think about it, GSM is clearly more expensive than CDMA in India, and yet three out of every four new subscribers choose GSM. Why is that? To think that CDMA is better and cheaper than GSM so that the choice must be CDMA shows a different business approach must be used in dealing with Asian countries. This illustrates how business is done in Asia: Malaysia has finally completed a space shuttle to go to the moon. There are three candidates to man the one person capsule. Each one is interviewed by the Prime Minister who decides the winner. The first man is an Indian who demands $ 1 million for the mission. He reasons that if the capsule has a technical problem and he will not be able to come back to earth, that money is for his wife. Fair enough, said the PM. The second man is an Malay who asks for half a million dollars. Wow, he is cheaper than the Indian. He must have a better chance to win the contest. But, the Malay says that as a Moslem he has 4 wives. So the total should be $ 2 million. Finally, the PM asks the Chinese candidate to name his price. The figure he comes up with is $ 3 million. "You are crazy, you are the most expensive ...", yells the PM. The Chinese calmly responds: "Sir, I ask for 3 million dollars. The first million is for you, the second million is for me, and we'll give the third million to the Indian to go to the moon." Guess who gets the job? And my friend, that is the Asian business culture.

To: slacker711 who wrote (52985)	6/30/2006 12:49:30 PM
From: LarsA	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 197001

slacker, I have been to India but that peculiar experience didn´t tell me why they prefer GSM as do people e.g. in China. We often say that CDMA is superior but that is in reality mostly limited to spectrum efficiency. My own guess is the choice and price of handsets -and the SIM card feature. The SIM card is often neglected in the overall comparison. Not only the ability to carry with you your own calling data on the SIM card but the ability to bring your unlocked phone and pick up a cheap local SIM card (painless, no formality) for roaming all around the world (or use your own SIM card and telephone no) is a big deal. My guess is that the lack of SIM cards or RUIM in CDMA phones (that´s still true, right) is as big a disadvantage as anything else. Is there some patent involved that can explain it? Lars

To: slacker711 who wrote (52985)	6/30/2006 4:22:43 PM
From: Lance Bredvold	Respond to of 197001

"...Think about it, GSM is clearly more expensive than CDMA in India, and yet three out of every four new subscribers choose GSM. Why is that?..." Thanks for that clear exposition of the question. I don't have a lot of information to throw into the pot as I'm still using a Q thinphone on a 1X network. But I do have a lady friend in Israel who one year ago told me she had gone to Orange where she spends several hundred dollars each month, and replaced her wonderful Nokia phone (she had no idea what was GSM and what was CDMA) with a 3G phone. Since there was no Nokia offered (and she certainly would have taken whatever they offered over anything else I think), she was sold an LG. She brought it to the states in July and it looked awfully cute and functional to me. Took a picture of me with it. But could not make a call, so we found and removed the SIM to be put in another phone which would work in Seattle and LA using the LG for addresses and pictures only. She hated 3G (WCDMA by Orange and I don't remember who sold them the infrastructure in Israel--might even have been Nokia but more likely Motorola or ...) and complained that calls were dropped, reception was much worse, she could not take or make calls in her house about 50 KM NE of Tel Aviv, quality was poor and so on and so forth. As soon as she could, she exchanged that phone for a Nokia and by then the infrastructure had improved and presumably Nokia's phone also worked better. Thinking about that story it seems to me that we know QCOM is ahead of the competition, but that means whatever is associated with QCOM or the operators using QCOM's gear are taking the first bite out of the apple. (Wasn't it Ted Levitt who wrote a book suggesting that sensible companies would choose not to take the first bite out of a market?). I don't think we have any choice and don't think Irwin Jacobs had any real choice when he went into this business. He delayed standards as long as he could, but in the end we live or die based upon having the most promise for CDMA rather than having the best or broadest functioning system. Nokia, on the other hand, has been quite consistent in delaying the introduction of their phones until they are quite confident that the public will find them satisfactory or better. Mistakes have been made, but generally I think that is true. Getting back to my friend--she really attributes all good things to Nokia (even some which they had nothing to do with) and quickly blames someone else for whatever doesn't work her way. Clearly Nokia is not GSM or WCDMA but an operator might well find that many customers have such high regard for them that the halo effect blesses whatever system they happen to be running. If enough people walk over to the competition because they cannot get a Nokia phone at our place, I suspect our management should start to think maybe they'd be wise to at least add a GSM system on the same towers already being leased. I don't see a solution for QCOM. I've always regarded Irwin Jacobs as a knowledgeable, discrete and humble proponent of CDMA (no need to point out that you disagree, Eric) who saw most of the difficulties of getting the standard used early on. I hope that Paul Jacobs can mature into a similar authoritative voice and assume that Irwin is providing as much support as possible to that end right now. Look how far we have come. When I first bought shares of QCOM we had authoritative sounding voices telling me that CDMA was a physical impossibility, that Nokia and Ericy were the real inventors and had long ago discarded CDMA as impractical. A couple of trial systems which didn't work too well and GSM already well established. Best regards, Lance