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To: Drew Williams who wrote (15940)	10/3/1998 12:27:00 AM
From: Ruffian	Respond to of 152472

All, GSM & UMTS; GSM operators shunning UMTS Electronics Times Few GSM operators are keen on deploying third generation networks, raising the spectre that the rollout of UMTS services may take longer than expected, says Patrick Liot, president of Alcatel's professional and consumer division. "Japan has particular problems and NTT DoCoMo is keen to push ahead fast with the wideband CDMA technology," he said. "But elsewhere, we don't consider there is the same urgency." Liot said the quarrel between Qualcomm and ETSI may slow down standardisation towards third generation mobile technologies, and interim measures, such as upgrading GSM to higher data rate capabilities, may become more important. His own company has just added an Internet-ready version to its One Touch range of GSM phones that uses the Wireless Application Protocol (WAP), which itself will extend the lifetime of GSM networks. Ericsson, Nokia and [ Motorola ] are also working on mobiles that include the microbrowser, conceived by Unwired Planet. Alcatel admits few operators are yet ready to offer services to take advantage of the Internet-based interactive applications possible from the integrated microbrowser in the One Touch Pocket phone. (Copyright 1998) _____via IntellX_____ Publication Date: October 02, 1998 Powered by NewsReal's IndustryWatch ...back to top

To: Drew Williams who wrote (15940)	10/5/1998 3:41:00 AM
From: Rajala	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 152472

>They (Iridium & Globalstar) are intended to augment rather than >replace existing services. For instance, I will be able to drive >all around my third world home state of Pennsylvania and not >have to worry about gaps in land based network infrastructure. IMO satellite telephony has a very poor business case. (Disclaimer: my opinions are based more on I than G). I wants to sell trumpet-size handsets for $1750 in the States and for $3000 in France. You know the States better, but I just can not see anybody buying one in France. Secret service agents, perhaps, or an occasional nutty millionaire. Cellular network covers everything, including 40 km out to sea, and roaming aboard is very common. The problem is that the time-to-market for satellite systems was a dozen years and it shows. Bulky phone, reportedly bad voice quality, short battery life, practically no coverage indoors, bad coverage if shadowed by tall buildings. System will be improved no doubt, but there are technical constraints. One is the distance to the base station. Its 1,400 km minimum for Iridium (satellite happens to be right above you) and 40 km maximum for GSM, which put severe limitation on the voice quality, phone size and battery life. Also, as it was earlier noted on this thread, when a $1 component fails the whole satellite may be rendered useless. The problem is further accelerated by limiting the number of satellites (both I and G did this). Why? To save costs. What does that do to quality I can only guess, but the distances grew further for starters. IMO competent systems were designed initially but what we are getting now is scrape-through solutions. And look at the market. Its a well known secret that there are no hordes of cash rich Eskimos waiting. The users will be the seriously wealthy with a penchant for remote outdoors and no sense of chic (well, that's still perhaps 50% of the American population). - rajala