3G Article>
nalysis: 3G standard debate heats up
By Peter Clarke and Loring Wirbel
EE Times
(12/11/98, 5:02 p.m. EDT)
STOCKHOLM, Sweden — As standard-setting deadlines for
third-generation (3G) mobile communications approach, the pressure is on
the companies and standards bodies seeking to define the future of the
cellular phone.Recently, there have been some strategic moves from several
key players but still no resolution of a stalemate on the licensing of
intellectual-property rights for a key technology: wideband code-division
multiple-access (CDMA) wireless communications.
A new standards organization, the Third Generation Project Partnership
(3GPP), held initial meetings this past week in Sophia Antipolis, France. In a
counterpunch, Qualcomm Inc. (San Diego) and supporters of its version of
CDMA, noting the 3GPP group's bias in favor of GSM, have launched their
own body, 3GPP2, which will support the EIA-backed IS-41 switching
infrastructure, along with Qualcomm proposals for wideband CDMA.
Amid the scrapping, the International Telecommunications Union (ITU)
warned that all CDMA radio proposals for its IMT-2000 initiative could be
thrown out unless the stalemate is resolved by month's end. Few observers
see the ITU's threat
as realistic, believing that the protagonists are engaging in brinkmanship and
will eventually resolve their differences. But most acknowledged that the
statement was a wake-up call.
Both L.M. Ericsson AB (Stockholm)-a high-profile player in the W-CDMA
camp represented by 3GPP-and Qualcomm claim to have rights to
technologies used within a number of the CDMA radio-interface proposals
currently before the ITU. Those include CDMA2000, favored by
Qualcomm, and the W-CDMA proposals favored by the regional
standards-setting bodies in Europe and Japan and backed by Ericsson and
NTT DoCoMo.
Ericsson AB has offered an apparent olive branch to supporters of
CDMA2000: With Nokia's backing, it suggested a change
to the W-CDMA proposals that it said would simplify the migration from
existing standards and would make dual-mode 3G handsets easier to
produce.
But an executive of Qualcomm said that Ericsson's offer to consider a new
"chip rate" for CDMA does little to move the camps toward a true resolution
of differences.
Qualcomm continues to advocate a single air interface for 3G; Ericsson,
Nokia and most other major players anticipate the standardization of multiple
air interfaces. But the major players are also eager to see an end to the
wrangling and uncertainty.
Yrjš Neuvo, senior vice president for product creation at Nokia Mobile
Phones, said the company believes "the harmonization process will result in
three major third generation standards-W-CDMA, CDMA2000 and
[time-division multiple-access-based] UWC136-bringing a smooth evolution
from various existing standards as well as providing enough compatibility.
Multiple modes in a single handset will then provide global service where
required by users."
While some of the activity in air-interface technology amounts to what
market analyst Herschel Shosteck called only "so much positioning," the
prize could be immense: a lead position in the market for cellular
communications systems by the new millenium. Wideband CDMA,
standardized in one or more forms, is expected to be the means by which
next-generation mobile terminals receive data at rates of up to 2
Mbits/second. But the differences among the CDMA variants and the IP
rights that accompany them have proved too contentious to work around.
Last week, however, the ITU warned that the industry must do just that-and
quickly-when it issued a statement that the legal stalemate centered on
Ericsson and Qualcomm could, in principle, disqualify all CDMA proposals
from 3G standards-setting.
"To conform with ITU patent policy," said Robert Jones, director of the ITU
Radiocommunications Bureau, "the holder of any known patent or any
patent-pending application related to any proposal made to the ITU in the
process of international standards-setting must submit a written statement
either waiving his rights [to the IP] or committing to negotiate licenses on a
non-discriminatory basis and on reasonable terms and conditions. Failure to
provide this statement ultimately excludes the proposal from the international
standards-setting process."
In its statement, the ITU said that while Qualcomm was prepared to grant
licenses on its essential IP contained within CDMA2000, on most other
CDMA proposals the company had proved unwilling thus far to negotiate
reasonable terms and conditions with other parties on a non-discriminatory
basis. The statement went on to list the conditions that Qualcomm had
specified for the ITU in a letter it had sent to the body in August.
Just last month, however, Irwin Jacobs, chief executive officer and founder
of Qualcomm, said he saw hope for a resolution of the IP-rights issue
between his company and its overseas rivals.
Anil Kripalani, vice president of planning and international administration at
Qualcomm, said that the ITU response was positive insofar as it recognizes
that Qualcomm is unswerving in its insistence on three 3G principles: that a
truly converged standard must unify a CDMA air interface; that the Mobile
Access Protocols of IS-41 and GSM must both be supported; and that
technology choices must be based on the technologically superior option,
while assuring backward compatibility for users.
As for the timing, Kripalani said it was no surprise that ITU had waited until
the 3GPP meeting to release its statement, since the ITU and European
Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) had continually put off giving
Qualcomm opportunities to air its views in the past year.
The ITU characterized Ericsson's position as readiness to license its IP but
on a condition of reciprocity, saying the company favors an approach
whereby each country or territory would be free to select from alternative
air-interface standards. The ITU said it had asked both Ericsson and
Qualcomm for detailed information on the claimed essential IP rights and that
the information was urgently needed to allow the IMT-2000
standards-setting procedure to continue.
Inaugural meeting
Last week saw more than 350 delegates gather for the inaugural meeting of
3GPP, which seeks to harmonize all of the W-CDMA proposals currently
before the ITU with the exception of CDMA2000 and thereby ensure
W-CDMA's selection as the dominant standard for 3G. The partnership's
planned harmonization of W-CDMA proposals is linked to the evolution of
GSM network architecture and software. The group hopes to enable the
rollout of the first 3G systems by 2001.
The five founding 3GPP organizations are the Association of Radio
Industries and Businesses (ARIB) and the Telecommunications Technology
Committee (TTC), from Japan; ETSI; the U.S. T1 standards committee; and
South Korea's Telecommunications Technology Association (TTA). Two
Chinese bodies-the Ministry of Information Industry and the Research
Institute of Telecommunications and Transmission-are also expected to join
3GPP.
ETSI director general Karl-Heinz Rosenbrock said the launch of 3GPP
"shows the commitment of the industry from the whole globe to develop the
next-generation mobile system based on GSM." But 3GPP is being driven
by ETSI, which has budgeted nearly $1 million to support its startup phase.
ETSI's heavy involvement was one factor that led to the U.S. CDMA
Development Group and Qualcomm to create 3GPP2, an organization
dedicated to joint support of IS-41 and GSM switching.
Fabio Leite, IMT-2000 counsellor at the ITU, commented, "We have
always seen work outside the ITU as a way of converging regional
standards. . . . A single radio interface for IMT-2000 is desirable. But if
that's not possible, we want a minimum number of radio interfaces."
Chip rate
Though Ericsson's offer to reduce the chip rate for W-CDMA proposals
came only 24 hours after the ITU issued its warning, Ake Persson, vice
president for marketing and sales at Ericsson Mobile Systems, said the offer
was not a response to the ITU statement. "They [the ITU] are really trying to
put some pressure on Qualcomm and its IP-rights blocking position," he
said.
The chip rate is a metric of how data is transmitted within spread-spectrum
CDMA communications. It's roughly equivalent to the spreading of a signal,
with a "chip" defined as the binary element of a CDMA coding sequence.
Ericsson has suggested a reduction from the present 4.096 Mchips/second
to 3.840 Mchips/s.
But the newly suggested chip rate remains 3.6864 Mchips/s of CDMA2000.
That rate, Qualcomm's Kripalani said, is identical to a "frames" proposal that
Ericsson and other GSM vendors made a year ago; the 4.096 rate was
added later, to win DoCoMo's support.
Thus, in Qualcomm's view, a move back to the 3.840 rate represents a
willingness by Ericsson to consider other rates but still shows an arbitrariness
driven by "advocates of competitive disadvantage," Kripalani said.
He pointed out that Qualcomm has already dropped many technical
demands made last summer, such as a desire for variable-rate speech
codecs. But Qualcomm wants to see synchronized basestations and use of a
shared time-shifted pilot tone, he said.
Nokia said it is generally positive Ericsson's proposal, interpreting it as a call
for adoption of a common chip rate between W-CDMA and CDMA2000.
DoCoMo said it was still considering Ericsson's proposal at press time.
Ericsson said that the adoption of a lower rate would harmonize the
W-DCMA and CDMA2000 systems by making it possible for
manufacturers to produce low-cost dual-mode mobile phones and terminals
to serve users across the two system standards.
"We are very optimistic that our proposal meets with all requirements for
harmonized 3G standards for users of GSM, TDMA IS-136, CDMAOne
and PDC equally well," said Persson. "This approach would offer equal
access to global terminal market volumes and also facilitate global roaming,
yet minimize the inevitable reduction of system performance that comes with
a lower chip rate."
But Ian Channing, an industry observer who publishes telecom newsletters in
the United Kingdom, noted that in the past Ericsson has said a reduction in
chip rate would degrade W-CDMA performance. "This is what Ericsson has
always refused to do. They had claimed that a reduction of the chip rate
would hurt 3G," he said. "Given their historical opposition to a reduction in
chip rate, this is a major change of stance by Ericsson."
Persson responded by acknowledging the chip-rate reduction "will reduce
the [call-carrying] capacity of the radio a little-but only a very little.
"We think that [the reduction] is more than balanced by the advantages for
dual-mode phones. The suggestion follows research by handset vendors,
including Nokia and Motorola." |
