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Press Release:
Step One: Europe's regulators must relax licensing terms,
let operators chart their own technology courses.
Operators that paid too much for 3G licenses, technology that won't be ready
for at least three years, and skeptical investors add up to a losing
proposition. But winning solutions are available. That is one of the main
conclusions of the new 60-page report UMTS at the Crossroads: Strategies for
Success.
"Europe's UMTS operators are scaling back construction plans and delaying
commercial launches left and right," said Chetan Sharma, co-author of the
report along with Sunil Jain. "It's time to give operators the tools they
need to compete in the changing global market," he concluded.
"This report presents realistic solutions for building the 3G wireless
business -- from a cohesive strategy using GPRS, EDGE, and public wireless
LANs to GSM1x to allowing dual use of UMTS spectrum," said Ira Brodsky,
of Datacomm Research. "Unless a new approach is taken, the
strategies of GSM operators in Europe and Asia will start to diverge," he
concluded.
UMTS at the Crossroads: Strategies for Success is a report for government
policy makers and vendor business strategists. It includes an Executive
Summary identifying the best strategies for moving forward. The report
examines the events leading up to the current situation, 3G progress in
Asia, the challenges confronting UMTS, and the best technology and business
alternatives.
Additional Conslusions from the study:
1. Europe's UMTS operators face serious challenges. Many can't afford to
build nationwide networks in the 2.1 GHz band. Dual-mode handsets
(W-CDMA/GSM) will take time to perfect. W-CDMA is more likely to succeed in
Japan, where NTT DoCoMo is building a nationwide network that doesn't
require dual-mode handsets.
2. Europe's regulators must give operators more time and flexibility. All
reasonable options should be considered including infrastructure sharing,
spectrum swapping, disaggregation of spectrum for resale or leasing, and
alternative technologies.
3. Prospects for GSM1x, the CDMA2000 overlay for GSM, are particularly good
in Asia where some operators own both GSM and CDMA2000 networks. GSM1x
enables GSM operators to upgrade to 3G in existing spectrum, and allows
combining dual networks to reduce operating costs and provide users a
best-of-both-worlds solution.
4. Customer uptake of wireless data services will fall short of near-term
return on investment (ROI) goals. 3G operators must offer competitively
priced voice services. Thus, 2G operators upgrading to 3G are better
positioned than are "green field" UMTS operators. The report explains how
UMTS operators can transform this weakness into strength.
5. CDMA2000 will capture the majority of 3G subscribers for at least the
next three years. Some 2G operators, particularly in Asia, will be forced to
reevaluate their 3G strategies. CDMA450, a CDMA2000 solution for the 450 MHz
band, is particularly attractive to operators in Russia, Eastern Europe, and
Africa.
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