Hutchison sticks to 3G timeline

date: July 22, 2001

Canning Fok, managing director of Hutchison Whampoa, said on Saturday it plans to roll out 3G mobile services in Europe in mid-2002 despite Vodafone's warning that 3G service could delayed until 2003 due to technical problems and shortages of 3G-enabled handsets.

Hutchison remains positive on the future of 3G and is sticking with its European launch date in Austria, Italy, Sweden and the UK despite the telecom melt down caused by poor sales and high 3G licenses cost.

Fok told reporters any delay with its rivals will be good news for Hutchison.

Hutchison in July has already signed a deal with Motorola for the delivery of 3G wireless devices for its world-wide operations and he said Hutchison plans to sign handset deals with other makers.

Some in the industry have expressed concern about the late rollout of handsets capable of supporting both existing and 3G networks.

Fok said Hutchison remains enthusiastic about 3G despite the more sober view taken by others because Hutchison is big and lacks the financial constraints that plague some of the firm's pure-telecoms carrier rivals.

He also said Hutchison's 3G capital expense is lower than expected, and that rivals have approached it about sharing cell sites, which could save it up to 40 percent in infrastructure costs.

Fok said that unlike Vodafone that has 2G baggage, which must migrate from its legacy 2G networks, Hutchison has what he considers the advantage of building 3G networks from scratch and the business model more flexible than operators.

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