Third generation mobiles feature live video

Zatni Arbi, Columnist, Jakarta, zatni@cbn.net.id

Every time I'm in Hong Kong, I'm bound to be using my feet much more per day than in the month before. The Hong Kong government has really made it so convenient for its people to walk around, even when it pours all day long like it did when I was in that unique city last week.

But, there is also another reason why I have to walk so much more over there than I normally do in Jakarta: I always get lost in Hong Kong. The skyscrapers, the shopping centers and the shops always look the same to me, and so do the alleys and their intersections.

So, like last week, for example, I walked around and around inside an area of a few blocks before I finally got to Windsor House, where we could find some of Hong Kong's upscale computer stores. I missed the last turn toward this building because I had thought that the traffic, which, as far as I recalled, was one way, would be coming from just the opposite direction.

When Hong Kong finally gets the third generation (3G) mobile phone network, I might not have to walk so much-if I'm lucky enough to still get invited for press events in this city, that is. Last week I was there for the 3G World Congress, in which Qualcomm and a dozen other companies showcased their latest products and discussed various topics around CDMA2000 1X, Qualcomm's 3G wireless standard.

There was a lot of hype and a high dose of optimism, of course, and it was very clear that Qualcomm, the American company that provided the CDMA technology, was very eager to dominate the worldwide 3G market.

They know too well they currently have an unprecedented window of opportunity, as Wideband CDMA, their competitor from the GSM crowd, is not yet available except in Japan. WCDMA supporters reportedly point to 2004 or 2005 as the dates for their 3G systems to become commercially available on a larger scale.

Why do I think that I will no longer get lost in the Web of streets and alleys in Hong Kong? The CDMA2000-based mobile handsets will use chipsets that support the gpsOne feature. This feature will enable me to see where I am at any given time on a map that will change as I move.

During one of the interviews, Paul E. Jacobs, Group President, Wireless & Internet Group, showed me and a few other IT journalists from ASEAN countries his handset that featured an application called Position Location. The most interesting thing was that, despite the complexity of the task, the handset was still as small as any of today's tiny two-part handsets that can be flipped open. It has a color screen, which makes reading maps of streets and alleys much easier.

The application in Paul's demo handset was a mockup, actually, as the Position Location service is not yet available in Hong Kong. Hutchison Whampoa plans to roll out its 3G service by the end of this year, and it will be some time before Position Location will be there to guide me as I walk around inside the concrete jungle.

I was told that the accuracy of Position Location was even better than the satellite-based Global Positioning System. The application will still be using data from the GPS satellites, and interpolate them with the data from the base transceiver stations to determine my location, but because it does not depend solely on the satellites, my position can still be detected within a range of 50 meters even when I am inside the basement of a high- rise building.

There were some anecdotal examples of how this feature may help us. One of the stories that Qualcomm's executives was fond of telling journalists was about a suspecting wife who bought the CDMA2000 1X handset, placed it inside her husband's car without his knowledge, and checked the Web site of the service provider. She found out that her husband frequented a place that he was not supposed to visit. The rest of the story was quite predictable.

How is the real market acceptance for 3G? There has been a lot of debate between the doubtful and the upbeat. As in a lot of places the charge for using the services is considered the key success factor. However, there has been some real progress in the growth of CDMA2000 that is worth noting.

During the conference, it was announced that the number of this 3G mobile phone service has reached 10 million worldwide. In techno-savvy South Korea, as I wrote last March, CDMA2000 1X has been available commercially since October 2000.

In January this year, Korea Telecom FreeTel (KTF) began to offer a version of the standard that was optimized for data. It is called CDMA2000 1X EV DO. The data-optimized (DO) standard enabled those with the right handsets to watch World Cup games in live video.

In Japan, the picture seems to be even brighter for this 3G standard. KDDI started its operation there in April, and during the conference it reported that it had listed 829,000 subscribers. In contrast, as reported during the event, DoCoMo was able to get only 112,000 3G subscribers after around eight months of operation. DoCoMo, like many West European operators, chose WCDMA as their 3G standard.

Worldwide, 15 operators have already launched their CDMA2000 services. In China, the service offered by China Unicom has not picked up as fast as they would like to see, but as the prices of the handsets get lower and lower, the company may eventually take off.

During the conference I also learned that the two Indonesian operators who were going to offer the first 3G in this country were PT Ratelindo and PT Wireless Indonesia.

One word of caution, here, is that these two operators must not charge us too high for the services. Because of lesser economies of scale, the 3G handsets are already much more expensive than the GSM handsets to begin with, and this will certainly scare off would-be subscribers.

Secondly, not many of us Indonesians will require sophisticated services offered by 3G. The majority of us are already content with voice and SMS. These two operators should carefully decide how they are going to charge the cash-strapped mobile phone user community in Indonesia if they want to survive and succeed.