TEMPE, Ariz.-The new subscriber growth of the North American cellular phone market will decline for the remainder of the decade, according to a report by Forward Concepts.
With 13 percent of the U.S. population served by cellular in 1995, the report predicts that almost 24 percent will be cellular subscribers by 2001. Although the subscriber base will grow at a forecasted 11.5 percent compound rate, the number of new subscribers will become fewer each year as the served population nears overload, said Forward Concepts.
The decline will be in new analog customers. Digital subscribers will increase at a 21.7 percent compound rate, presenting digital signal processing market opportunities. Canada is also included in the market analysis.
The report, “North American Digital Cellular Technology & DSP Market Opportunities,” is an in-depth analysis of the technical implementation of DSP chips and cores for the Time Division Multiple Access subscriber set market defined by Interim Standard 54/IS-136. The report also provides a technical overview of Code Division Multiple Access chip technology as defined by IS-95, said Forward Concepts.
“Because the overseas GSM (Global System for Mobile communications) cellular market is much larger than the U.S. digital cellular market, most chip suppliers have chosen to address only GSM,” said Forward Concepts President Will Strauss. “We see about a dozen second-tier chip suppliers chasing the GSM market, most clawing for single-digit market shares left over after nearly three quarters of the market is already staked out by the major DSP chip suppliers.”
“We believe there is a greater opportunity for smaller DSP chip houses to address the North American market than in chasing the crumbs left in the GSM market.”
The technical section of the report, written by experts in digital wireless technology, compares more than a dozen DSP chips and cores for their suitability in serving the North American TDMA market, said Forward Concepts.
