Close below the surface of the third-generation mobile-phone spectrum debate is a technology war, the kind of feud industry thought was behind it and wanted to avoid as it tries to present a unified front in the campaign to wrestle away frequencies from the Pentagon.
For some firms, 3G spectrum does not exist in vacuum. It is a function of technology, which, in turn, is a function of business.
Qualcomm Inc., maker of CDMA chips and software, and mobile-phone carriers that use the technology are not singing off the same song sheet as the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association. They are not jumping up and down, screaming the sky is going to fall if industry fails to win the Department of Defense’s 1700 MHz band.
Quite the contrary. The CDMA crowd, Verizon Wireless being the big exception, is hopping mad about what it considers a strategy of 3G fear mongering by CTIA, a tack it believes unfairly punishes firms in a free market designed to reward innovation. Qualcomm and its followers view CTIA’s 3G lobbying effort as a bailout for several large CTIA members that simply made bad business decisions.
Qualcomm believes its flavor of CDMA-cdma2000-is superior in all respects to a W-CDMA technology embraced by carriers AT&T Wireless, Cingular Wireless and VoiceStream Wireless and by European manufacturers Nokia Corp. and L.M. Ericsson. W-CDMA proponents feel otherwise.
In the real world, billions of dollars in 3G contracts around the world are at stake.
While it builds to both standards, Motorola Inc., the top U.S. mobile-phone supplier and a global force, is a strong advocate of securing 1700 MHz spectrum from the Pentagon. Lucent Technologies Inc., at one time a fierce advocate of Qualcomm CDMA technology, has its own problems.
Qualcomm, Leap Wireless, Sprint PCS and others are not shy about telling policy-makers there is not a 3G spectrum shortage. Sure, more spectrum would be nice, they say, but there’s plenty to roll out 3G in America later this year. They insist the U.S. is not behind Japan and Europe, a favorite refrain of CTIA.
The bottom line: It is not in the best interests of Qualcomm, Sprint PCS, Qwest, Alltel, Leap, NextWave and others for DoD to lose the spectrum tug-of-war with industry.
No doubt, all this complicates industry’s legislative agenda on Capitol Hill. At the same time, industry’s “win-win” plan-whereby mobile-phone firms would spend billions (via auction) to relocate military radio systems to other, yet-to-be identified frequencies in exchange for the Pentagon’s 1700 MHz band-is gaining momentum in official Washington. Which is more than you can say for Gary Condit.
