QUALCOMM Inc announced an accelerated sampling schedule for customers of its highly integrated MSM6200 Mobile Station Modem solution. The MSM6200 solution begins sampling to customers this month, three months earlier than previously scheduled, following recent successful live voice and data calls in public demonstrations using MSM6200-based test terminals. Key milestones in QUALCOMM's WCDMA/UMTS/GSM/GPRS program include:

-- First live international WCDMA/UMTS roaming call (using a QUALCOMM test terminal, December 2001)

-- Only public demonstrations of WCDMA/UMTS voice calls with multiple infrastructure partners (3GSM World Congress, February 2002)

-- First to announce a direct conversion radioOne(TM) solution for WCDMA/UMTS/GSM/GPRS (February 2002)

-- First public demonstration of wireless WCDMA/UMTS and GSM calls using a dual-mode chipset in a small form factor handset (CTIA Wireless 2002, March 2002)

-- First to conduct WCDMA/GSM calls using a direct conversion dual-mode chipset (June 2002)

"We are pleased to accelerate MSM6200 samples to meet the strong interest of potential customers in Europe and Asia who are eager to begin development of multimode products for 3G networks," said Johan Lodenius, senior vice president of marketing and product management for QUALCOMM CDMA Technologies. "We were able to improve the schedule by a full quarter due to the progress we have made in the development and testing of our fully optimized UMTS dual-mode solution."
The MSM6200 chipset and system software, QUALCOMM's second generation of WCDMA chipsets, is a highly integrated single-chip multimode solution that supports the Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) mode of WCDMA -- also known as UMTS -- as well as GSM and GPRS. Supporting data rates of up to 384 kbps in WCDMA/UMTS mode, the MSM6200 is targeted at manufacturers designing wireless devices for emerging 3G markets. Like all members of the MSM6xxx family, the MSM6200 chipset features QUALCOMM's radioOne direct RF-to-baseband conversion technology, which eliminates the need for large IF SAW filters and additional IF circuitry to reduce handset bill of materials.
The MSM6200 solution also supports QUALCOMM's Wireless Internet Launchpad(TM) suite of advanced multimedia, connectivity, position location, user interface and removable storage functionality. A number of key Wireless Internet Launchpad features available for the MSM6200 solution include:

-- Support for Multimedia Message Service (MMS)-based applications through an integrated MMS-compliant browser
-- Qtv(TM) video software for the playback of previously stored MPEG-4-based video files
-- BREWapi, allowing handset manufacturers and developers to more quickly and easily develop both embedded and downloadable components and BREW(TM)-based products
-- A fully integrated JAVA(R) virtual machine
-- Integrated Bluetooth(TM) support
-- JPEG decoder/encoder software for camera-based applications, such as sending and receiving pictures via e-mail
-- 32-polyphony MIDI wavetable synthesizer for high-quality music playback through the MSM6200 integrated wideband codec
-- Qtunes(TM) MP3 player software
-- 2D/3D game and graphic engine
-- Support for location-based services by utilizing the MGP6200(TM) Multimode Global Positioning System (GPS) Processor and system software, which directly interfaces to the MSM6200 chip

BREWapi consists of a set of interfaces that enables manufacturers and developers to create wireless applications, including browsers and user interfaces, by offering easy and consistent access to MSM chip-level functions such as graphics and bitmap display support, position location information, and the ability to play a music file or display a still image or an animation file.