Although attention across Europe is shifting to 3G launches, GPRS pricing itself remains highly complex, with an average price for 10MB inclusive volume standing at EUR 12.80  according to a new report from BroadGroup.

Inclusive MB pricing is the most commonly used tariff structure by the 83 mobile operators across 31 countries, whose prices are included in the survey. Fewer than 20% restrict their GPRS service offering to usage based charges only.
The report found evidence of a general correlation between pricing and per MB inclusive packages across the tariffs and service providers covered in Europe. Although prices in certain volume categories show examples of dramatic divergences, average prices displayed a reasonable level of consistency up to 50MB. But beyond this volume, pricing behaviour is much more erratic.
Overall however, the report and tariff tables reveal a multiplicity of taxes, excess charging tiers, roaming definitions, and pricing and billing increments that are employed.
Other inconsistencies emerged, including the comparatively cheap GPRS pricing found in former eastern European countries, and Accession States.
As GPRS services experience a new life cycle, supported by EDGE deployment, user familiarity with faster access to web based content will continue to diffuse. The report notes that operators will need to ensure barriers to adoption are removed.
“If it is accepted that customer perception of data is changing, and pricing needs to be accessible, the complexity associated with GPRS pricing must also change. Bundling with Wi-Fi or 3G imposes new constraints on GPRS tariffs, which in turn suggests that current structures are not sustainable if congruence in pricing is to be achieved,” commented Philip Low of BroadGroup.
The report provides several hundred GPRS tariff schedules across 83 operators in 31 European countries.

Dilithium Networks, a supplier of 3G multimedia solutions, has launched a  DTG200 gateway product, aimed at resolving the problem of video corruption between the IP network and 3G network.

The DTG2000 incorporates Dilithium Networks’ Video Refresh, a patent pending technology that lessens the duration of video corruption due to air interface, interference and noise, while maintaining the highest possible frame rate.
In the case of video mail message retrieval and streaming applications, video files are typically stored in a compressed format on a server. Corruptions in the bitstream of a video frame not only affect the present picture being processed but can also affect many subsequent video frames for up to 13 seconds. The local detection of the errors by the video gateway simplifies the function of the video-mail server and increases the quality of video.
The DTG2000 can detect video corruption during both the deposit and retrieval of messages.
“The ability to minimize video corruption enables service providers to build next-generation converged voice-video networks and create revenue-generating services, especially for video portal and  video mail applications,” Lee Ellison, senior vice president of sales and marketing of Dilithium Networks.

Nokia has announced that it has completed the change out of 2000 GSM base stations for O2, and is now the sole supplier of 2G base stations to the operator. O2’s previous incarnation, BT Cellnet, sourced much of its 2G technology from Motorola, which was not one of the companies shortlisted for 3G supply contracts in April 2002.

The two companies who were shortlisted were Nortel and Nokia, who have both just announced further details of their 3G network supply contracts with the operator.
Nokia’s change out of previous 2G infrastructure was partly done with the aim of improving optimisation and interoperabilty between the 2G and 3G network.
Nokia is providing 3G coverage specifically within the M25 London motorway ring area. Nortel Networks will supply O2 with products from its Base Transceiver Station (BTS), Mobile Switching Center (MSC), Radio Network Controller (RNC), and Data Server Node (GGSN, SGSN) technology portfolios.
O2 has expanded Nortel Networks’ role as a 3G infrastructure supplier to deploy UMTS radio equipment in Eastern and Southern Germany (including Berlin) and across most regions of the British Isles. Nortel Networks was previously selected by O2 to provide GPRS and UMTS core networks.
Infrastructure deployments will expand network coverage into new regions in the UK and Germany, and position O2 to drive new revenue opportunities by offering advanced data services like mobile email, video calling, mobile Internet browsing, and Multi Media Services (MMS) including streaming video and localised, personalised content.
“We are pleased to be building out the system that will bring high-speed 3G services to our Irish, German and UK customers and we chose Nokia’s 3G system thanks to its good performance and the solidity of its system roadmap,” said Dave Williams, Chief Technology Officer, O2.
“We are happy to be working with O2 in bringing 3G to some of the world’s premier markets for advanced mobile multimedia services,” Peter Kühne, vice president, Networks, Nokia, said. 
Peter MacKinnon, president GSM/UMTS at Nortel Networks, said. “We are delighted with O2’s decision to expand the scope of our contribution to their European network. Nortel Networks extensive experience in deploying large-scale wideband wireless networks gives us a big advantage in turning up UMTS in a rapid, cost-effective manner.”

Agilent Technologies has launched a service assurance solution that is intended to guide operators through the complexity of offering QoS over UMTS  networks and new voice, video and data services.

This monitoring solution enables wireless carriers to aggregate data from key UMTS interfaces, by collating data both from the network elements and by passively monitoring the signalling.
Agilent says that several operators in Europe, Asia and America are testing this solution to speed their new services to market and identify and resolve performance issues before subscribers are affected.
Agilent has integrated its Distributed Network Analyzer, Data Mining Toolkit and Signaling Analyzer solutions into one service assurance solution, the UMTS Performance Analyzer.
An integrated approach means users can more easily identify and troubleshoot issues across the UMTS network and understand the performance of voice and data services. UMTS Performance Analyzer provides insight into the quality and performance of the Radio Access Network, either in a large area, such as an entire city, or down to a cell or user granularity. It monitors and troubleshoots inter-RNC (radio network controller) handovers and reports on the performance of the network and UMTS and GPRS services.
Tom Walls, vp and general manager of Agilent’s OSS division said that operators will not get the same margin for error launching 3G services as they did with 2G, yet the network is much more complicated.
“The UMTS RAN is in the order of 10 times more complicated than GPRS/GSM. The whole radio side has changed and it also has to interact with the 2G and 2.5G networks. There are big issues and all of the information available with current tools is not giving a clear picture of where and why  problems are occurring.”
Neil McKinlay, business development manager within Agilent’s OSS division said that the Performance Analyser monitors the control plane of the networks interfaces to give and independent view of what is happening.
“For instance, a UMTS call might require up to a thousand protocol messages to be exchanged to set up a call, over three to four different radio paths. If one path drops it may look to the operator that the call is still up but the user experience is of a degraded call quality,” McKinlay said.

Qualcomm has bought UK User Interface developer Trigenix with the intention of adding the software to its BREW client software model. 

QUALCOMM paid approximately US $36 million in cash for Trigenix, which had become something of a star pupil of the mobile community, developing brandable UI solutions that allowed operators to directly push out services to users in a themed manner.
BREW includes a UI Toolkit alongside its client software,  and the Trigenix capabilities will be “added” to that, Qualcomm claimed, boosting the US vendor’s presence in the European market.
“Adding the capabilities of Trigenix technologies, including the Trigenix Trigplayer(TM), provides an expanded UI development tool set that allows BREW operators and device manufacturers to custom build core phone functions like address books, messaging menus, navigation methods, colour schemes and icon s3tyles” a Qualcomm statement said.
The solution also permits secure, periodic over-the-air (OTA) updates, allowing anv operator to “push” new content to the UI, such as branding refreshes and marketing promotions, as well as periodic software updates or feature upgrades to the handset.
“QUALCOMM’s acquisition of Trigenix marks a significant next step in the company’s efforts to bring enhanced 3G wireless data services to Europe,” said Peggy Johnson, president of QUALCOMM Internet Services.
“Joining a wireless leader such as QUALCOMM, and strengthening our relationship with the worldwide community of BREW publishers, developers, operators and handset manufacturers, provides an excellent chance to advance Trigenix technology and better meet the need for customisable UI products and services,” said Steve Ives, CEO, Trigenix.

Siemens Communications (the newly- formed business division) says it will be the first vendor to bring an “end-to-end solution” for “High Speed Downlink Packet Access” (HSDPA) to market, complete with PC card.

HSDPA will enable operators to significantly boost data rates in UMTS networks and provide their subscribers with average download speeds of up to 2-3Mbps, roughly corresponding to  the faster DSL connection rates.
The introduction of HSDPA has been described by some vendors as a possible entry point to the market for those with few existing UMTS contracts. It is therefore crucial that “incumbent” UMTS vendors such as Siemens display good migration stories to their operator customers.
Accordingly, in January 2005, Siemens will  conduct its first live demonstrations of a HSDPA network. Field tests will begin with mobile operators in Japan and Europe in the second quarter 2005. The vendor says its HSDPA solution, comprising network equipment and HSDPA PC cards, will be available for commercial operation beginning from the fourth quarter of 2005.
“With the early availability of our HSDPA solution, we will be putting UMTS mobile operators in pole position: They’ll be the first in the market to be able to offer average download speeds of up to two to three megabits per second,” said Christoph Caselitz, president of Mobile Networks at Siemens Communications. “This turbo data service will be a crucial buying criterion, first and foremost on the part of business users. The first providers to have this service in their portfolios will be able to reap the highest margins.”
Siemens says that customers will be able to integrate HSDPA into an existing UMTS network via a software update as since 2002 all its UMTS base stations have been HSDPA. This reduces the additional investments required for operators to be able to provide high added value to a lucrative customer segment, business users.
HSDPA allows more users than before to be provided simultaneously with higher data rates. This means that the existing frequency band is better utilized and the costs per bit reduced. Mobile operators can thus improve their margins with increased traffic in the networks.
High Speed Downlink Packet Access involves a modulation mode that affords theoretical downlink data rates of up to 14 Mbit/s, a theoretical value under laboratory conditions. In actual practice, though, downlink rates per subscriber will still range between 2-3Mbps.
HSDPA is an element of Release 5 of the WCDMA (Wideband Code Division Multiplex) specifications. This new UMTS performance feature contains a transfer format called “high-speed downlink shared channel”.
Consumers will notice HSDPA in the form of a significantly better quality of service. Performance will be considerably improved, for example, in connection with downloads, Internet access or access to enterprise networks.

David Levin, Symbian’s ceo, has heralded the operating software company’s move into the mid-tier by announcing an increased investment programme that will increase the company’s headcount by a third.

Levin said the company (recently boosted by increased investment from minority member Sony-Ericsson) was set to increase its cost base from £70 million to £100 million a year and its staff numbers from 900 to 1200.
“We have achieved market leadership status in the high end market and the question now is how we transition to the wider market,” he said.
Levin said Symbian had investigated the lowest possible cost at which a handset developer could assemble a phone capable of supporting the Symbian OS at $132 per unit, excluding the radio licence costs, which are too variable to be estimable.
That number would drop to $80 within five years, he said, due to lowering costs of phone hardware and component costs. This would mean that the total addressable market for the Symbian OS in 2008 could be as much as 200 million phones annually, compared to 59 million “smartphone” units manufactured in 2003.
Levin said that although the company had made good progress it had a long way to go to achieve its ambition of being a serious platform for the mid-market phone. But he said Symbian’s policy was “fully-funded” and  not “just a piece of [Powerpoint] slideware.”
One hope for the OS developer is an agreement with Intel and Nokia for the joint production of a reference platform to allow OEMs and ODMs to develop mid-market Symbian phones. The reference platform would address about 75% of what was required to make a phone platform, he said, leaving room for manufacturer differentiation whilst reducing time to market.
Levin said that Symbian was proving to be the most profitable platform for operators in terms of subscribers downloading applications. Levin said what the industry needed was some level of standardisation, and he paid welcome to the OMTP Group, which has been put together by a group of operators to try and define the handset requirements necessary for mobile devices to deliver openly available standardised application interfaces to provide customers with a more consistent user experience across different devices.
Levin pointed out that Vodafone live! requires handsets to meet 3,000 product specifications. Different platforms meant increased expense in terms of call centre and customer support, but this has to be balanced against the ability of handsets and operators to develop their own customisation.
Ovum’s Jessica Figueras said that mobile platform players such such as Symbian should focus on technologies which enable dynamic device customisation and help put a balance back in the industry.
“We’ve seen enough platform battles in the mobile device space with Symbian versus Microsoft, Microsoft versus Nokia or Nokia versus Vodafone,’ she said.
The latest battleground focuses on mobile operators’ desire to customise mobile devices, in order to reflect their own service branding and create a differentiated user experience.
“But a straight fight between operators and manufacturers promises few benefits for developers and enterprises. Manufacturers do not always support them well today, and there is no reason why operators should necessarily make a better job of it.” 
Figueras believes that “the great customisation debate” has clearly become very polarised. 
“It is often presented as a zero-sum game, where one side must win at the expense of the other. But this view is wrong and unhelpful. The best outcome is one where a balance between the interests of all of the value chain members can be achieved – not only for manufacturers and operators, but also for developers, enterprises, end-users and platform providers.”
The most important is the new possibility of “dynamic device customisation” technologies such as over-the-air downloading, firmware updating and device skinning.
An open approach from the platform providers will open up the market for a range of specialist providers, she argued. Companies like Surfkitchen, Trigenix (now Qualcomm, p8), Bitfone, Macromedia, Redbend, Action Engine and SavaJe play in this space.
“The big platform providers must and will play an important part in enabling this new model to take place, but their offerings will be seen less and less as the be-all and end-all. A healthy mix of different platform technologies will be active at different layers in the overall platform stack,” Figueras said.

A US company that provides a mobile version of thin client computing, giving a new way to provide wireless email services, has launched the personal edition of its software.

Sproqit Technologies, which describes itself as the “embedded technology leader in intelligent thin-client mobile computing” dispenses with the store-forward mechanism of most wireless email solutions, instead setting up a direct link through a secure connection.
“Sproqit looked at the current solutions and found that they were very limited in terms of functionality, performance and expansion into new applications. We also found that the main bottleneck was the anitquated store and forward architectures they are all using,” said Peter Mansour, founder and CEO of Sproqit Technologies. “We decided to work from a clean slate to create the next generation architecture.
“If you compare Sproqit, feature-for-feature, with other solutions, you’ll see that it is faster, offers more features and has better usuability.”

Qualcomm has gone public with one of its first deals to supply its WCDMA technology to a major European mobile manufacturer.

Siemens will build its UMTS phones on Qualcomm’s WCDMA chipsets, from its branded Mobile Station Modem portfolio. The announcement comes as Qualcomm gears up its move into the European market (see p8).
“Siemens has a long tradition of providing high quality products, and our selection of Qualcomm’s chipsets will enable us to continue that tradition,” said Thorsten Heins, Member of the Board of Siemens Communications. Â “Qualcomm’s WCDMA product portfolio provides us with the ability to create multiple products across varied market segments while reducing development costs.”
“This agreement is another endorsement of the quality achieved by the rigorous end-to-end modem and applications testing that Qualcomm is known for in the industry,” said Dr. Sanjay K Jha, president of Qualcomm CDMA Technologies. Â “We’ve developed a long-term WCDMA (UMTS) strategy that expands our portfolio to include EDGE, HSDPA and Enhanced Uplink — providing our customers with solutions that achieve their short- and long-term goals.”