GSA reports accelerating rollout of EDGE/3G WCDMA

July 22, 2004

GSA, the Global mobile Suppliers Association, confirms that the rollout of WCDMA and EDGE-enabled services is rapidly accelerating globally. There are 37 commercial WCDMA networks and a further 13 at pre-commercial stage. There is a growing trend to combined WCDMA/EDGE networks. GSA also confirms 103 operators who have committed to deploy EDGE in their networks across 64 countries, of which 27 are providing commercial services.

In recent months, several operators launched commercial or pre-commercial enhanced mobile services on GSM/EDGE/WCDMA networks. Some networks will be WCDMA only - however, since EDGE and WCDMA share the same packet core network, an increasing number of operators including TIM, TeliaSonera, AT&T Wireless and CSL have already confirmed their plans to exploit the flexibility of both radio access solutions in a single harmonised network for optimum performance, coverage and flexibility, at lowest cost for acceptable user experience.

At end May 2004 there were 5.6 million WCDMA subscribers. Commercial services were being offered on 37 networks in 21 countries. The drivers for operators to deploy WCDMA in their networks are lowest operating cost, capacity (which translates to increased revenue opportunities) and the best user experience of 3G services.

Today there is also a widespread acceptance of the benefits of GSM operators deploying EDGE - Enhanced Datarates for Global Evolution, which like WCDMA, is standardised by ITU as a member of the IMT2000 family of 3G systems. EDGE triples GPRS datarates in live practical environments and frees up time slots, which can also be used to boost voice capacity. Coverage is also improved. EDGE can be deployed using existing GSM licenses, existing cell sites and frequency planning for only a small (less than 10%) incremental cost when compared to GPRS, delivering new services revenue growth and shortening 3G services time to market.

Many operators intend to offer 3G services using a combination of WCDMA and EDGE, particularly for the rural areas instead of a WCDMA only network, gaining operational efficiencies and making significant capital expenditure savings.

WCDMA commercialization will accelerate in 2004-2005. The next step, which all WCDMA operators are expected to take, is known as High Speed Data Packet Access -HSDPA. This is an enhancement to WCDMA, as EDGE is an enhancement to GPRS. The HSDPA feature will allow operators to deliver even greater wireless broadband speeds - typically 3 - 4 Mbps in commercial networks. HSDPA is expected to be commercially deployed from 2005.