China Mobile to commence TD-LTE trials in Q1’11
China Mobile will initiate TD-LTE trials in six cities in the first quarter of 2011, indicating the operator is edging closer to a commercial launch.
The operator will deploy over 3,000 TD-LTE base stations, including 2,500 outdoors and 500 indoors- in Beijing, Shanghai, Gaungzhou, Nanjing, Shenzhen and Xiamen.
According to ccid.com, China Mobile will use the 1.9GHz frequency band for the outdoor networks, while the indoor networks, will run on the 2.3 GHz band.
According to Yu Shengduo, a Director at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the MIIT has completed tests on 2.6-GHz TD-LTE equipment and chips, and is now focusing on 2.3GHz TD-LTE gear.
According to ccid.com, companies like Samsung, Qualcomm and ZTE have been actively involved in tests of the TD-LTE chipset.
According to China Mobile’s previous statement, it planned to launch TD-LTE in the third quarter of 2011 but the plan was reportedly postponed to 2012 due to slow development of chipsets and handsets.
To speed up TD-LTE chip and handset development, China Mobile has reinforced its partnership with OEMs, handset makers and chipset manufacturers in Taiwan.
Chunghwa Telecom, China Unicom in discussions over Cooperation
China Unicom Chairman Chang Xiaobing will soon hold talks with Chunghwa Telecom Co., Ltd.`s president, S.T. Chang, over cooperation on value-added mobile service, roaming service and submarine-cable service.
Industry executives projected that the two carriers would work together to set up a digital convergence platform for iPad and iPhone for Chinese community, lay more submarine cables directly connecting Taiwan with mainland China, and lower rates of roaming services on the two sides of the Taiwan Straits.
According to the executives, a Chinese digital convergence platform for iPad and iPhone would help accelerate the entry of Taiwan`s digital contents into the mainland market. They added that more submarine cables that directly link the two sides are needed as the telecom bandwidth required by the people on the two sides for cross-strait connections has grown at annual rate of 20%. Chunghwa Telecom and China Telecom are laying the cable that link Xiamen of the mainland and Kinmen Island of Taiwan while a cable that will link Danshui of Taiwan and Fujian of the mainland is being constructed by Tawan`s top three telecom carriers and their mainland counterparts.
China Unicom has also invited its global partners to attend the conference in Hong Kong. The partners include Taiwan`s telecom carriers Chunghwa, Taiwan Mobile Corp., Far EasTone Telecom Co., Ltd., and Vibo Telecom Co., Ltd.; equipment suppliers Nokia-Siemens, Ericsson, and Alcatel-Lucent; and handset makers HTC Corp.
China Mobile about to deploy TD-LTE trials
China Mobile is planning to commence TD-LTE trials in as many as half a dozen cities.
As per reports citing, Chairman Wang Jianzhou, equipment for what would be the world’s first metro TD-LTE trials is in place and the company is waiting for MIIT approval. The operator has a TD-LTE trial network for the past six months at the Shanghai Expo, which closed last week.
As per Mr. Wang, TD-LTE had progressed faster than expected, mainly because of the massive growth in data services in China, and the fast take-up of smartphones. Many foreign operators were interested in the trials, which would take place in three to six cities.
According to reports, the operator has deployed 3,000 base stations in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Nanjing, Shenzhen and Xiamen.
According to the analyst, He Tingrun, chip development was the weakest link in the TD-LTE value chain, and the government also needed to offer incentives to handset manufacturers. The government-owned research institute CATR last month began testing 2.6GHz TD-LTE chips.
3G licenses Far from Release
The timetable has been extended from this year to the middle of next year to clear up possible restructuring in the telecom market and complete patent negotiations, a Beijing-based consulting firm said yesterday.
The development of homegrown third-generation technology, which earlier influenced the schedule, is now on track, however, industry officials said.
“Considering the factors, our most optimistic expectation for the issuance of 3G licenses is the middle of 2007,” Norson Telecom Consulting said in a report. “At that time, only one TD- SCDMA license will be issued first to show the government’s support for its homegrown technology.”
China Mobile will adopt the time division-synchronous code division multiple access network, according to Norson.
Previously, most industry officials and investment banks, including UBS AG, expected China to launch licenses by the end of this year or at the beginning of 2007. And earlier forecasts put the issue date at the middle of this year.
China plans to issue only three licenses for the higher- data flow services, so the telecom industry is widely expected to restructure prior to the start of the licensing process.
China Telecom, the country’s biggest fixed-line phone carrier, plans to buy China Unicom’s CDMA network, as part of the restructuring.
Telecom industry restructuring, including China Netcom’s move to acquire China Unicom’s GSM (global system for mobile communications) operations, won’t be wrapped up in the near term, industry insiders said.
On the patent issue, the biggest bottleneck is that US- based chip designer Qualcomm has not agreed to lower patent fees for Chinese manufacturers.
“It is not a problem that can be solved within a year,” said an official at ZTE Corp who declined to be identified.
Since 2002, the telecommunications industry has lost count of the number of times China has delayed the issue of 3G licenses. The industry had thought the nation’s first 3G licenses might be issued May 17, World Telecommunications Day, but nothing happened.
MII officials, who said in public previously that China will issue 3G licenses this year, declined to comment on the timetable now.
There are three available 3G technologies, which provide high transfer data speed and allow users to download movies and hold video conferences on cell phones. They are the U.S.- developed CDMA2000(Code Division Multiple Access 2000), European-developed WCDMA(Wideband CDMA) and China’s TD- SCDMA(Time Division-Synchronous CDMA).
Analysts said China will issue a national TD-SCDMA license first, then issue two other licenses later to support the homegrown standard. China’s standard is not fully ready for commercial use, which forced the government to delay issuing the licenses.
The 3G licenses will be issued later. The(government- supported) TD-SCDMA Forum said recently the TD-SCDMA test is expected to complete in the third quarter compared to an earlier timetable of June 30, Dong Xiaoyang, Norson’s analyst, said in the statement.
Currently, the TD-SCDMA technology is being tested in Qingdao in Shandong Province, Baoding in Hebei Province, and Xiamen in Fujian Province. By the end of this year, the annual production capacity of TD-SCDMA phones will hit 1 million units, according to the TD-SCDMA Forum.
China Telecom, the country’s biggest fixed-line phone operator, said it can provide services on the TD-SCDMA network in eight months.
By comparison, WCDMA and CDMA are used in more than 200 3G networks globally and their technologies and services are mature.
Source- http://www.tmcnet.com
Technorati : 3G, China, China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom
Ice Rocket : 3G, China, China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom
