INNOVATIONS OF MOBILE COMMUNICATIONSTANDARDS AND THEIR APPLICATIONS FOR TELECOMCOMPANIES

Fonville, Cosmas, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands,281530cf@student.eur.nlVan de Heuvel, Eveline,, Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands,291472eh@student.eur.nl

ABSTRACT

There have been many different generations of data communication standards in the telecomindustry throughout the years. Nowadays we are in the third generation. With the introduction of 2G, the second generation, digital phone calls could be made and that was the beginning of mobile internet. In this generation an extra generation has come up, called 2.5G. GPRS and EDGE are mobile data standards in this generation. In the third generation we are using Internet services like UMTS and HSDPA. The fourth generation is coming up and it is estimated that it will start in 2010. In this generation mobile users will be using new standards, like WiMAX or UMTS revision 8.The mobile internet speed has already reached 2 mbps, a speed which is enough for viewing web pages and running most applications on a mobile device. Why is the bandwidth being improved? New applications are being developed to add more functionality to a device. However, most newapplications require more bandwidth. We discuss whether the applications drive the innovationof new technologies or vice versa. We found out that most of the available bandwidth is far frombeing fully used. It is hard for telecom companies to come up with a killer application which usesenough bandwidth and is used by many people. A killer application is an application that isingeniously coded or unexpectedly useful. When the bandwidth was not fast enough, theapplications were a driver for the technology but now the technology meets the applicationdemands with ease. We can conclude that in the beginning (2G) the application was the driver but with the evolvement of 3G and the speculation of 4G it is something else driving theinnovation.We have also found that fixed networks are driving the innovation of mobile networks. This might sound a bit confusing because fixed networks and mobile networks seem to be very different. However, there is a constant comparison of mobile and fixed network capabilities. The fixed networks exist longer than the wireless networks and have always been faster. Some factors can slow down the innovation of mobile networks. The factors found in this paper are: devicelimitations, investments in hypes by telecom companies and the lack of good applications.

INTRODUCTION

1.1

Research question

The research question that we are going to answer in this paper is:What are innovations of mobile communication standards and their applications for telecomcompanies?We have also formulated two sub questions, namely:

•

What is the past, present and future of different mobile communication standards?

•

Why does innovation of mobile communication standards take place?For answering these questions we have searched for a lot of information on the Internet and askedquestions at Vodafone and Ammeon, two telecom companies. There are many definitions of theword innovation. We will use Schilling’s definition: ”The practical implementation of an ideainto a new device or process”.

1.2

Structure

Chapter 2 gives an overview of different mobile communication standards in the past, the presentand in the future. These standards give an appropriate perspective from which to view theinnovations and help to understand how they will be developed. Chapter 3 gives a view of factorsdriving and limiting innovation of mobile communication standards. The effect of applicationsand fixed networks on the innovation of mobile networks will be discussed. Finally, in Chapter 4conclusions will be drawn and an answer is given to the research question and the sub questions.

MOBILE DATA STANDARDS

Although this paper is about innovations for telecom companies, it is important to give anoverview of different communication standards in the past, next to the standards in the presentand the future. The overview of these standards gives an appropriate perspective from which toview the innovations and help to understand how they will be developed. It will be easier tounderstand where we are going if we understand where we have been. To help in thatunderstanding, this chapter will give an overview of mobile data standards and differentgenerations. Because there has been, and still is a large amount of different standards all over theworld, only the standards that we think are relevant will be discussed. We have also tried not tofocus too much on the technical details of the mobile standards, otherwise it would become tooextensive. For extra information it is possible to take a look at the sources in the last chapter of this paper.Before we had cellular phones there used to be mobile radio telephones like MTS (MobileTelephone System), launched in 1946, and IMTS (Improved Mobile Telephone System),launched in 1962. Contrary to normal closed radio telephones, like radio telephones used by the police or emergency services, these phones were connected to the public switched telephonenetwork and had their own telephone number

[1]

. Using this system was very exclusive. IMTS hadwaiting lists of three years for those who wanted to make use of this service. These potential userswere literally waiting for other users to disconnect their subscription in order to get a mobiletelephone number and mobile phone service. This resulted in low sales of IMTS phones andtherefore they were very expensive: 2000 to 4000 dollars. The price of phone calls varied from0.70 to 1.20 dollar and the monthly subscription charge started at 100 dollars

[2]

. These phones are

typically called the zero generation (0G) of mobile telecommunication. The mobile radiotelephones were mainly used by estate agents and celebrities.In the early 1980s the first analog cellular phone made its entry, the beginning of the firstgeneration (1G). It could only carry voice traffic. However, each country developed its ownsystem. In America AMPS (Advanced Mobile Phone System) was developed, and in someEuropean countries, such as the UK and Ireland, TACS (Total Access Communication System)was being used

[3]

. But in many countries the developed system was incompatible with the systemabroad. Once European inhabitants realized this, they started the Conference of European Postand Telegraphs (CEPT) in 1982. During this conference they formed a study group called GroupeSpécial Mobile (GSM). This group had the mission to develop a mobile system that wascompatible in Europe. Later on the acronym GSM would be changed in ‘Global System for Mobile communications’

[4]

2.1

As stated in the introduction of this chapter, GSM study group was formed to develop a pan-European mobile service. The system had to meet certain criteria such as support, compatibility,low costs, speech quality and more. The first public operation of GSM started in 1991 and thisintroduced the second generation (2G) or in full: ‘Second Generation Wireless TelephoneTechnology’. The main difference between 1G and 2G is that 1G uses analog networks and 2Guses digital networks. Because of the digital networks, voice data could be compressed in a muchmore effective way compared to analog networks. Also did the digital systems emit less power from the phones, which not only made it possible to create smaller cells, with antennas andelectronic communications equipment, but made phones also use less energy and cause lesshealth concerns. Some other advantages of digital networks are digital error checking and the possibility to send and receive SMS and e-mail

[5]

. Next to 2G also the terms 2.5G and 2.75G have come up, but these terms are not officiallydefined. 2.5G services enable data transfer over upgraded existing 2G networks because they use package switched domains, which is normally used in 3G services, in addition to the circuitswitched domain. GPRS is an example of 2.5G. A protocol like EDGE is technically a 3Gnetwork technique, but referred to as 2.5G or sometimes even 2.75G

[6]

because it has a data rateof over 144 kbps but has slower network speed than usual 3G services.

2.1.1

GPRS

GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) is a mobile data service which improves wireless access tonetworks like the Internet. Data packages are efficiently being transferred between mobile phonesand external data networks. GPRS data rates can go up to 128 kbps, so it is much faster thanconventional GSM which has a rate for data transmission restricted to 14.4 kbps

[7]

. GPRS is a package switched service, so the data transfer is charged per kilobyte, contrary to the circuitswitched services which is charged per second. This means that the user can be online for a longtime and will only be billed for the transmitted data

[8]

2.1.2

EDGE

EDGE (Enhanced Data GSM Evolution) has an increased data transmission rate and reliability. It provides up to three times the data capacity of GPRS, namely 384 kbps. It allows for exampledownloading video and music clips and e-mail on the move. Basically it is an add-on for GPRSnetworks, that is why it is sometimes called EGPRS (Enhanced GPRS). Each phone with GPRScan also use EDGE, but beyond GPRS, EDGE looks a bit more like UMTS. The difference