InterDigital Inc (IDCC)

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Motorola sees higher market share in Europe this year



By Anne Morris, TOTAL TELECOM, in Cannes
24 February 2004

U.S. vendor unveils four new devices in Cannes, including two more 3G models.



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Motorola launched four new devices at the 3GSM World Congress in Cannes as the U.S. vendor outlined its aim to increase market share in Europe this year.

At the show the company unveiled its E1000 3G handset – described as "UMTS in a 2.5G package". This device is set to be launched on the market by the end of 2004.


In addition, Motorola launched the A1000 3G device, a small PDA targeted at enterprise customers; the MPx, a qwerty email device; and the MPx100 clam phone.

The company hopes that these products will help it to increase its share of the European handset market from a current level of around 9% to 10%.

"We are coming back in Europe," said Tom Lynch, president and CEO of Motorola's mobile division.

According to Motorola COO and president Mike Zafirovski, the company is "poised to gain market share in 2004."

"Europe has been the wild card," Zafirovski added.

Now that Motorola has won its first UMTS deal in Europe, in Portugal, it also expects to be able to announce more deals on the infrastructure side in the coming two years.

"It's a long game and we are here to win it," said Lynch.

He added that Motorola is already working on the next level of UMTS – HSDPA.

According to Adrian Nemcek, CEO of Motorola's infrastructure division, Motorola believes HSDPA – or high-speed downlink packet access – is necessary because of what he sees as the "insatiable demand for data".

"With this technology you can download the entire works of Shakespeare on a mobile phone in less than 20 seconds," he claimed.

Also at Cannes, Motorola said its IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) solution would be ready for customer trials by mid 2004. IMS is the basis for technologies such as push-to-talk over cellular (PoC) and mobile instant messaging, for example.

The vendor said PoC would be its first solution on IMS and announced plans to license its PoC technology to third-party device manufacturers and software developers.