Qualcomm Inc (QCOM)

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Saturday, November 27, 2004 12:11 AM

http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/NewsStory.aspx?section=INFOTECH&oid=64098

Siemens aims for leading position in Asia's 3G/W-CDMA industry

As the W-CDMA technology picks up speed in Asia, Siemens positions itself to become one of the key players of this new innovation by recently joining in the debut of the 3G/W-CDMA base tation.


The Siemens Communications group intends to supply a major share of this market with W-CDMA infrastructure and to build on its global 3G success with its partner NEC.


“By the year 2009, W-CDMA will account for an investment share of around 80 percent of Asian mobile networks. Thanks to our long-standing contacts with operations in the region, we see ourselves as being outstandingly positioned to equip our partners for the 3G age. Our target is to attain the leading position in this arena,” said Siemens Communications Group president Lothar Pauly during the recent 3G World Congress in Hong Kong.


Aimed to promote and expand 3G worldwide, the event is the telecom industry’s established global forum for discussion of the challenges and solution that face the industry today.


The recent 3G World Congress and Exhibition offered delegates the opportunity to consider 2G-to-3G migration issues relating to CDMA2000, W-CDMA and China’s proposed TD-SCMA technologies, among others. This reflects the need of Asian carriers who are facing fiercely competitive markets, changing regulatory environments, complex choices and legacy issues.


Recently, Siemens signed a 3G/W-CDMA contract with Malaysian operator Maxis. Technology leaders Siemens and NEC also debuted the new generation of NB-880 W-CDMA base stations in Hong Kong. These base stations are more cost-effective for operators as they require around one-third less electricity, which in effect can serve larger numbers of subscribers. It is also equipped with the 3G/W-CDMA turbo data service HSDPA.


Asia offers mobile markets that are in different stages of development. While 3G telephony is commonly used in Japan, it is not until recently that licenses and initial contracts were awarded in most of the other countries in the region. Siemens is especially interested to penetrate China, where licenses are expected to be awarded next year.


Siemens intends to supply the Chinese market with 3G/W-CDMA and the TD-SCMA technology, the local 3G standard that the firm is developing in a joint venture with Huawei. Within a few years, China will be Asia’s largest market accounting for around 40 percent of operator investment in 3G/W-CDMA. Currently, Siemens and NEC are already the leading suppliers of this country. “Today more than 10 million mobile subscribers worldwide are making phone calls over 3G/W-CDMA and with 90 percent of all W-CDMA users using the Siemens-NEC technology. We intend to build upon this success in Asia,” Pauly added.


He also noted that the focus of this development is the IMS (IP-based Multimedia Subsystem), a standardized platform that can quickly and cost-effectively provide a wealth of IP-based applications such as the push and talk or the walkie-talkie function for mobile handsets, which also runs on IMS. Siemens is currently showing this practical new service and is currently being introduced to the market. “By next year, Asia will already be overtaking Europe in demand for mobile enterprise solutions and will actually drive the market for them,” said Pauly.


In Hong Kong Siemens and NEC also debuted the new NB-880 3G/W-CDMA base station. This is the third-generation 3G/W-CDMA base station, which will begin shipping in January 2005.


These base stations come with the HSDPA turbo data service. HSDPA provides average download speeds of between two to three megabytes per second for 3G/W-CDMA subscribers. This roughly corresponds to the fastest DSL connection that is currently available in the market.

In addition, these new base stations are extremely economical when it comes to power consumption. Mobile operators can save around one-third on energy costs using this service. Moreover, they can also serve twice as many subscribers that will, in effect, make them market leaders in terms of capacity. The comparison with GSM is especially vivid since a NodeB 880 offers the same subscriber capacity as 10 GSM base stations put together.