US : There is no doubt that the WiMAX camp is celebrating the choice of Sprint Nextel for their nationwide network - and rightly so.

The selection by Sprint, whatever the driving motives, is a vote of confidence in the yet-unproven technology. Many people have since asked us what Sprint's choice of a rival means to UMTS TDD, and how our technology will evolve moving forward.

The answer is that our Alliance's strategies have always evolved with changing market dynamics. UMTS TDD was a successful commercial Wireless Broadband technology before Sprint or Nextel even went to RFP, and we shall continue to be successful going forward. For wireless ISPs, we are a proven, working solution to providing broadband coverage, and for established cellular carriers, we are a logical step both on the roadmap to LTE and in the evolution of mobile TV standards.

FierceWireless Editor, Lynette Luna, correctly observed: "While a decision from Sprint in favor of TD-CDMA would have given the technology a significant boost, we'll probably see IPWireless' [UMTS TDD standard] technology an important part of the next phase of the UMTS standard, LTE. And it could score big with a deal in Japan as well as its mobile TV initiatives." Ms. Luna's observations very closely reflect our main thrusts. Below, we update you on our three current strategic initiatives - LTE, mobile TV, and potential strategic partnerships.

The roadmap to LTE indicates most carriers will arrive at that destination sometime around 2011. At LTE, their cellular networks will be fully upgraded to all-IP, media-agnostic, high-speed pipes, fully capable of integrating into a fixed and mobile IMS telecom infrastructure. The cellular carriers have been mostly cautions with their wireless broadband efforts, trying to be sure that they keep them on the main road to LTE (EDGE, UMTS, HSxPA are all stops on the road). Yet, these stops have not delivered the kind of high-bandwidth realities that provide new generations of services at radically improved economies. In contrast, UMTS TDD can do this, all the while remaining on the road to LTE. By staying on the road, UMTS TDD can avoid the supplemental, and redundant costs that may arise from launching a divergent technology like Flash-OFDM or WiMAX. Thus, we can offer the best of both worlds: global UMTS standards-based technology, on the roadmap to LTE, with high spectral efficiency, proven technology, and a good business case.

But how does our technology get a foothold among carriers who are focused on 3G and HSDPA for "broadband"? The answer is with mobile TV. Tier 1 carriers in Western Europe are trying to develop a successful mobile TV strategy. Yet unicast over 3G puts too much a burden on the network, and broadcast eats up too much of the valuable spectrum they bought for 3G (and wastes a great deal, since that spectrum is synchronous FDD). If the carriers outsource the TV broadcast network to other vendors, they can avoid the need to build their own, but will also lose control of the content...and the revenue stream. However, almost every EU carrier that bought 3G spectrum was also allocated a (internationally harmonized) 5MHz chunk of TDD spectrum in the 2.5GHz band. By using MBMS (broadcast) technologies and UMTS TDD in that currently unused 5 MHz, carriers can launch their own mobile TV service. By launching a mobile TV network with spectrum that they already own, and using UMTS technology that they already understand, carriers can capture the revenue stream, and retain control of the customer experience in order to differentiate from the competition. Also, since the frequencies are harmonized, subscribers can access content when they roam to different countries. Thus, mobile TV is both an exciting opportunity for UMTS TDD technology, but also a great entry point into carrier networks.

On a side note regarding HSxPA: while HSxPA is a good improvement, carriers are learning that it isn't enough of an improvement in spectral efficiency to radically change 3G data business models. But don't think we're negative about HSxPA... UMTS TDD fully benefits from the enhancements of HSxPA - we just apply them to the TDD variant of the UMTS standard, and thus retain our performance advantage multiplier. Several of our TDD networks already take advantage of HSxPA.

The last thing we promised to discuss today is strategic partnerships. The Alliance believes that we would benefit from the participation of additional major vendors or a manufacturing cluster, and as such, we are investigating potential relationships with both. For example, the Chinese UMTS standard, TD-SCDMA, though fraught performance difficulties, is rife with manufacturing potential when those difficulties get ironed out. A closer collaboration between the UMTS TDD community and the TD-SCDMA community could bring together the best of both. From our side, proven, commercialized, highly efficient wireless broadband technology, from the TD-SCDMA side, a focused group of manufacturers, international technology promotion, and the scale required to bring it into the spotlight. This is just one of the partnerships that we are evaluating. As we said, our Alliance has always evolved with changing market dynamics, and now is no exception.

The future of UMTS TDD is an compelling and important topic for us. We hope you will join us for the 6th UMTS TDD Alliance Summit, November 8-10, in London, for a lively conversation on this topic - and many others.

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This Weeks 3G News