| |
Qualcomm CEO warns US gov to think about licensing model
January 22, 2003
Qualcomm CEO Irwin Jacobs told a gathering of peers at the Pacific
Telecommunications Council gathering in Hawaii that government regulators
need to think twice about the model used for licensing spectrum
for 3G licenses.
Jacobs said one of the obstacles to rolling out 3G networks is
spectrum limitations dictated by governments. “We need to carefully
examine whether we are unreasonably restricting the use of different
frequency bands,” Jacobs said, suggesting that many lower bands
could be opened up.
“The ITU has not specified a particular frequency band, but there
are some regions, and some regulators and some legislators that
say it can't be third generation unless it's in this spectrum, the
2.1GHz for example,” he said.
Telecom operators in Europe have spent billions in government auctions
to buy up spectrum for 3G services. However, few operators have
been able to roll out the services and have found themselves burdened
by the heavy debt loads. Jacobs said he understood governments using
the auctions as a revenue source, “but that doesn't necessarily
get the technology out to the users as quickly as possible and as
economically as possible.”
Despite the slow rollout of 3G services, Jacobs said 20% of phones
shipped this year would be 3G-capable. Regardless of whether that
target is reached, most 3G phones in 2003 will be based on Qualcomm's
cdma2000 1x technology, which has been a success story in Korea
and is catching on in China. Jacobs claimed his company has already
shipped some 70 million CDMA chips.
Jacobs also warned his colleagues that the telecom slump will continue
this year, forcing the industry to be more innovative in order to
spur sales. An example, he said, is the introduction by year's end
of several “true world phones” that will operate on GSM and CDMA
networks.
|
3G Motorola A920
