Optimus, Huawei achieve 150 Mbps speeds over 2.6 GHz LTE (Portugal)
Huawei and Optimus have demonstrated an LTE trial that achieved downlink speeds of 150 Mbps per user, and uplink speed of 60 Mbps.
In early 2010, Optimus selected Huawei to modernize its GSM network in Portugal, enabling a fast LTE launch in the future. As per the cintract, Huawei’s mobile base stations will be installed in 33 regions. To date, Huawei has deployed more than 1,000 SingleRAN sites to Optimus.
According to Jos© Pinto Correia, Executive Board member and Chief Technology Officer of Optimus, Huawei’s SingleRAN platform enabled Optimus to achieve a step beyond in terms of network performance, while reducing the total cost of ownership. Huawei team’s commitment and competence were crucial for the success of the project, reinforcing the long term partnership between the two companies. LTE first results are very promising and confirm the stability and high performance of Huawei’s solution, guaranteeing readiness for LTE deployment.
T-Mobile Austria contracts Huawei for network upgrade
T-Mobile Austria has contracted Chinese vendor Huawei Technologies to roll out its Long Term Evolution (LTE) network and upgrade its GSM network.
According to reports, the contract runs until 2016 and includes LTE deployment in Vienna and state capitals. In October 2010 T-Mobile Austria’s LTE network went live in the city of Innsbruck, and it revealed plans to expand 4G coverage to all state capitals, investing up to US$692.3 million until 2014.
By the end of 2013 a quarter of Austria’s population should be covered by the LTE network, whilst T-Mobile’s GSM/EDGE network will receive upgrades resulting in an energy usage reduction of up to 40%.
Verizon releases global mobile hotspot
Verizon has launched the first mobile hotspot to offer data service in more than 200 countries, and will also provide 3G speed to 120 of these countries.
The Fivespot comes with a built-in SIM card, and can handle up to five Wi-Fi devices at a time. It links to GSM networks as well as Verizon’s own Evolution-Data Optimized (EV-DO) network. It also Supports standards include CDMA, WCDMA, HSDPA, HSUPA, GSM, GPRS and EDGE networks.
There are various different international price plans which are not very pocket friendly. The lowest-cost gives a 5GB allowance in the US and Canada plus 100MB in ‘select countries’, and costs US$129.99. There’s also a Global-Access Pay Per Use option for those who sign up for the company’s US$59.99 Mobile Broadband service plan in the US; data costs US$0.002 per KB in Canada, US$0.005 per KB in Mexico and US$0.02 per KB in more than 200 other destinations.
The Fivespot itself will be on sale for US$99.99 after a US$100 mail-in rebate with a new two-year customer agreement. Manufactured by ZTE, it measures about four inches by two by half an inch thick, and weighs less than three pounds.
Costa Rica’s users declines to Switch to GSM
Despite so many network problems the users of Costa Rica are not welling to switch to GSM network. Costa Rica has around 73,000 users of an older TDMA network. According to the sources, some of the problems the network has suffered are unsent messages, calls cut and lack of coverage in some areas. According to ICE, the problems with the service is due to needed maintenance, causing problems with the frequencies assigned to the TDMA.
The TDMA network is outstanding to be switched off at the end of this year, but as per the company, this cannot happen until the customers shift to the newer system.
Although the company ensures that customers can retain their old phone numbers when switching networks.
The government is currently in the process of auctioning off up to three networks network licenses, but it is not predictable that any of the new networks will be operational in time to take advantage of customers switching from ICE’s TDMA service.
BSNL cancels GSM network contract with Huawei (India)
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: China’s Huawei lost 20 million lines GSM network contract with the state owned telecom operator of India, BSNL, after the latter cancelled it because of the unacceptable conditions imposed by Huawei.
However, Huawei has always denied the rumors allegedly linking it to Chinese government and military. BSNL has been asked by the Indian government to make sure that there are no software exploits within any equipment supplied by Huawei. BSNL might retender the contracts as the one with Ericsson covering the North and Eastern regions are also not finalized yet.
Earlier, it was reported that if there is any problem in Huawei tender, Alcatel-Lucent might take over the contract in the lines with Huawei’s tender prices.
For 25-million lines for the North Zone and 18-million lines for the East Zone, BSNL shortlisted Ericsson while Huawei was selected for 25-million lines for the South Zone. Initially, BSNL wanted to award the contract for Western zone to Huawei but later it contended that western zone was not a priority.
3G services and GSM will be provisioned for some 21 million lines. The total sum spent on these contracts is estimated to be US$6.5 billion.
Telenor concerned over lack of spectrum (India)
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Claiming it as the largest single day launch in telecom history, Uninor, Telenor’s Indian unit launched its GSM network covering nearly 600 million people. But at the same time, the company also expressed its
concerns over the lack of spectrum.
The company said that when they got the license, they were said to be given extra spectrum after reaching certain subscribers level. Two third of Uninor is owned by Scandinavia’s Telenor while the rest is owned by India’s Unitech Group.
The company plans to cover 22 telecom circles in India in which eight circles will be covered in this month while five will be covered early next year. Instead of offering per second billing, Uninor has offered 25 paise per minute tariff for local calls, and 49 paise for STD.
A mobile revolution in rural India
The total mobile penetration may have reached 14 per cent of India’s population. However, industry experts assert 13 per cent of this is in urban centres and only one per cent in villages.
The opportunity is not lost on market players like Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited and Reliance Communications who have been present in this segment for a while.
Now Hutchison Telecom, Bharti Airtel and Tata Teleservices too have descended on the turf with big network expansion plans and innovative marketing strategies specially tailored for these regions.
“The B and C category census towns are raking in good business for us. Currently, almost 35 per cent of our business comes from these circles. However, the potential here is immense as only a per cent of the total population actually use mobile phones,” says a spokesperson for Tata Teleservices.
TTS, operating in 20 of the existing 23 mobile telephony circles in India, is using a door-to-door marketing strategy, involving members of gram panchayats and trained market-feelers to make residents of villages and small towns aware of the usefulness of mobile telephony and how the system of pre-paid refills work.
According to the company spokesperson, value-for-money handsets priced between Rs 1,000 and Rs 1,400 with a plethora of tariff plans to choose from is what is driving subscription growth in these regions.
Sanjay Kapoor, joint president, mobility, Bharti Airtel, agrees with the trend and says his company had enjoyed a growth of 166 per cent in June of 2005-06 in circle C towns, as compared to a growth of 65 per cent in metros.
“We are concentrating on improving network connectivity in the rural areas along with existing circles we and are spending $1.5 billion this year for that purpose only,” says Kapoor. Airtel is appointing distributors at the tehsil level and using existing channels of fast moving consumer goods in these areas to push their products.
Reliance Communications will also make investments to the tune of Rs 1,500 crore (Rs 15 billion) till March 2007 to enhance its network in the eight global system for mobile communication circles it operates in.
The company plans to extend its GSM network to 4,000 towns in the existing circles of Bihar, Orissa, West Bengal, Himachal Pradesh, Assam, north east, Madhya Pradesh and Kolkata. Currently, its GSM network covers 340 towns in these circles.
A company spokesperson says the company has added over 200,000 subscribers in its eight Category C circles in the previous quarter alone. Reliance is importing handsets in bulk for use in these markets and is trying to leverage its low tariff plans to increase subscriber vase.
Handset manufacturers too are gearing up. Devinder Kishore, director of marketing at Nokia India, notes that handsets priced between Rs 10,000 and Rs 15,000 are reasonably popular in these regions.
“While the handset market in India is growing at an approximate rate of 75 per cent annually, about 30 per cent of the demand comes from metros now. The rural market, therefore is growing rapidly in terms of sales and it has a tremendous potential in future,” he says.
Nokia is using channels with territorial reach like Doordarshan and All India Radio to reach the interiors. The company has also incorporated nine Indian languages on certain handsets to promote sales.
Says Dinesh Sharma, marketing and sales head of Samsung CDMA, “Sales in category C towns are growing at a rapid pace. Currently the fasted growing circles for us are the categories A and B. Sales in metros have been slower, although absolute numbers are growing as almost a per cent of urban populace buy a phone every month”.
Sharma feels that for rural areas, incorporating local languages in handsets will become a focus area in future, as will be voice short messaging service, the latter dependent on service providers.
“Rural India is keen on high feature phones but not as much as urban India. A customer in the rural area is happy to have features, which are available in the urban markets. They are happy to have colour handsets, other accessories like phone book wherein he can store details of contacts, games, alarm tones and so on,” explains H S Bhatia, National Product Group Head- GSM Division, LG Electronics India.
Industry experts feel an estimated investment of around $6.5 billion would be needed to increase India’s rural tele-density to four per cent from the current one. With the current investments, the expectation may not be far off the mark.
Source- http://inhome.rediff.com
Technorati : BSNL, Bharti Airtel, Hutchison Telecom, India, Reliance Communication
Ice Rocket : BSNL, Bharti Airtel, Hutchison Telecom, India, Reliance Communication
