SOPHIA ANTIPOLIS, France-The European Telecommunications Standards Institute’s Technical Committee Special Mobile Group, which has been responsible for setting Global System for Mobile communications standards, announced it will close.
ETSI said most of the ongoing work performed by SMG will be transferred to the Third-Generation Partnership Project, with the necessary structural changes within 3GPP expected to be finalized by July.
“The new arrangement concentrates all GSM and Universal Mobile Telecommunications System specifications work into one body, which is open on equal terms to interested companies worldwide,” said Friedhelm Hillebrand, chairman of SMG. “It will ensure the integrity of the GSM/UMTS platform, eliminating the risk of incompatibility and inefficiency that might have arisen had the work remained distributed among independently acting groups.”
