InterDigital Inc (IDCC)

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China‘s Ministry of Information Industry (MII) is allocating 700 million yuan (US$84.58 million) in funds to TD-SCDMA developers, including Datang Mobile, ZTE Corporation and Huawei Technologies, in a move to speed up commercialization of TD-SCDMA technologies, according to the MII.

This will help developers keep pace with the plan for full TD-SCDMA commercialization by mid-year 2005, said Zhang Qi, a senior official at the Ministry of Information Industry, earlier this year.

TD-SCDMA is China‘s home-grown 3G standard jointly developed by state-owned Datang Mobile Communications Equipment Co Ltd and Germany‘s Siemens AG. Datang Mobile was allocated 200 million yuan, ZTE Corp and Huawai Technologies each received 100 million yuan, with various funds going to less established companies and academic institutions.

Although 700 million yuan is seen as insufficient to resolve key problems in the 3G field, it does signify strengthen support by the government for China‘s home-grown 3G standard, the newspaper said. Datang Mobile has already successfully developed its own TD-SCDMA handsets in March which were used in second stage field trials.

The company said it expects to launch mass production of the TD-SCDMA handsets in the first half of next year. Datang Mobile said its TD-SCDMA handsets have all the functions of mobile handsets including SMS service (short message service) and even 3G multi-media functions such as inbuilt digital cameras and Internet surfing capability.

http://www.tdscdma-forum.org/en/news/see.asp?id=549

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