WASHINGTON-An International Telecommunication Union task group in Beijing last week approved a carrier-crafted plan to harmonize competing U.S. and European Code Division Multiple Access technologies for Internet-friendly third-generation mobile phones, paving the way for the compromise to be translated into a new, global-roaming standard by year’s end.
ITU also is poised to approve a Time Division Multiple Access global 3G standard by the end of 1999.
The Operators Harmonization Group, a collection of U.S. and foreign wireless carriers, struck a deal recently in Toronto to converge U.S.-based cdma2000 technology-championed by some American operators and vendors (particularly Qualcomm Inc. and Lucent Technologies Inc.) and European-based wideband CDMA technology.
AirTouch Communications Inc., whose merger with Britain’s Vodafone plc played a major role in moving the 3G process beyond the cantankerous debate among manufacturers, feels major progress has been made.
“The important thing is to stop the squabbling,” said Jonathan Marshall, a spokesman for AirTouch. “I’m sure it didn’t hurt [the 3G process] that we’re going to be the largest buyer in the world.”
W-CDMA has strong backing from Finland’s Nokia Corp. and Sweden’s L.M. Ericsson and from carriers around the world that operate mobile phone systems driven by Global System for Mobile communications technology.
Earlier this year, an agreement was reached among U.S. and European wireless executives on an umbrella CDMA standard that included three operational modes and varying chip rates.
But the umbrella approach, being as broad as it was, gave rise to suspicions that proponents of cdma2000 and W-CDMA simply would go their ways and thereby defeat the goal of worldwide CDMA compatibility. That would create big problems for manufacturers, carriers and consumers in terms of cost and operational flexibility in the global economy.
That fear remains among some U.S. firms and policy makers in terms of whether the European Union will stick with a government directive to use W-CDMA for a pan-European 3G network. Today, American CDMA technology is locked out of Europe.
The TransAtlantic Business Dialogue forum meets here this week and wireless business executives and government leaders will discuss 3G and other issues important to the U.S. and Europe.
At one point, U.S.-EU differences over 3G standardization and trade nearly escalated into a trade war.
The Clinton administration is monitoring the 3G standards process and is planning to write the EU soon to remind European leaders that the United States expects the EU to incorporate technology agreements blessed by the ITU and not to discriminate against non-European wireless technologies in its 3G licensing process.
“We can’t help but be pleased by this development. It’s a market driven solution. We moved it out of the political arena,” said John Giere, vice president of strategic marketing and public affairs at Ericsson. Giere said Ericsson is optimistic about the timetable and deployment of 3G, which will begin to hit the market by 2001.
