Chinese 3G technology gets massive boost

TIMED TO COINCIDE with a conference taking place in Beijing tomorrow (26th April), there's been a flurry of chip announcements to support China's home-grown 3G technology - TD-SCDMA. In the frame are Analog Devices, Commit and T3G.

According to Analog, TD-SCDMA may eventually represent 25 per cent of China's 3G market by revenue. As Analog's Doug Grant told the INQ, TD-SCDMA has "made great strides over the last twelve months." It's gone from looking like a no-hoper to a serious commercial proposition.

Analog's play in this market surrounds a handset reference design, DTivy-A, which should enable any handset manufacturer to swiftly get up and running. Based on its SoftFone technology, the design includes sufficient processing power for multimedia applications such as MP3 audio, MPEG4 video and megapixel cameras, often without the need for a separate applications processor.

Analog's not alone, however. T3G Technology - an alliance between Samsung, Motorola and china's Datung has announced the world's first combined GSM and TD-SCDMA chipset.

Meanwhile Commit will be showing off four different TD-SCDMA mobile phones manufactured each by local manufacturers - DBTel, LGe, Bird and Lenovo.

Plus last month (March), Maxim had announced a two chip solution for TD-SCDMA handsets.

With all of this support, commercial operation of a TD-SCDMA network is looking increasingly imminent. The Chinese government has said that at least one mobile operator will be awarded a licence for TD-SCDMA if not more. µ