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To: SKIP PAUL who wrote (17471)	10/31/1998 11:20:00 AM
From: SKIP PAUL	Respond to of 152472

Telecom warriors slug it out Jack Robertson You wonder what planet the International Telecommunications Union is on. The ITU, the august telecom equivalent of the United Nations, has blanketed the press in the past two weeks, touting its Plenipotentiary Conference in Minneapolis-with nary a word on the bitter dogfight over the selection of a next-generation global wireless phone standard. Oh yes, the ITU has lots of laudatory verbiage about ongoing dialog to come up with the International Mobile Telecommunication-2000 (IMT-2000) standard, which would succeed the various cellular-phone formats that exist today. You would think it was one big lovefest, as the world's telecom bigwigs weighed the pros and cons of seven proposals. Behind the scenes, however, it's been fisticuffs as usual. The Europeans and the Japanese want their own version of a wideband CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) standard that is different from the proprietary CDMA format patented by Qualcomm Inc., San Diego. Qualcomm's standard is the basis for one of four U.S. IMT-2000 proposals. The South Koreans have yet another CDMA derivative, but, really, all that country wants is to sell any IMT-2000 CDMA handset to everyone in the world. European and Japanese IMT-2000 wideband CDMA concepts require some technology that must be licensed from Qualcomm. But negotiations haven't been going smoothly. Overseas CDMA protagonists have privately complained that Qualcomm is dragging its feet in negotiations and has set outlandish royalty demands. Korean CDMA handset makers say they have paid Qualcomm millions in licensing fees so far, which has put a dent in their low-margin cellular-phone operations. Qualcomm claims it is only seeking adequate compensation for its intellectual property. The non-U.S. CDMA advocates believe their technology is superior. The Europeans have an added incentive in proposing a hybrid IMT-2000 standard that is upwardly compatible with the existing European GSM cellular standard. But some veteran U.S. telecom warriors suspect a large element of the different European and Japanese standards is also competitive posturing against the U.S.-dominated CDMA format. They view the sparring as an extension of the cellular format wars that have been going on for decades. For its part, the United States is canvassing other major ITU players to win support behind the American IMT-2000 CDMA proposal. China, an emerging telecom powerhouse, is being intensely lobbied by the U.S. contingent. The IMT-2000 campaigning is almost as long as a U.S. Presidential race. The ITU working group for IMT-2000 hopes to have a tentative draft standard ready by next March. A final decision may even be made by the namesake year of the standard. Hopefully wiser heads will prevail over self-interest in this long deliberation, and the world won't end up divided again over conflicting wireless-phone formats. But, so far, the major camps seem to be digging in for a long fight.