Globalstar said Dacom, a gateway operator in Korea, will offer simplex data services to Globalstar customers in Korea, Southeast Asia, China and neighboring maritime regions.
Exports to China
China, India and Brazil are seen as big future markets for mobile content distribution, speakers said at the Midem conference in Cannes, France. Of China’s 400 million mobile users, 340 million don’t have Internet access, so a mobile platform would be their window to the world, said experts. The mobile phone might be the savior of music labels in China, said Linktone’s Robert Robinson. Linktone reports 8.9 million users a month for its ring tones, ringback tones and interactive voice messages. An advantage for operators and content providers alike is the fast replacement cycle for mobile handsets. Mobile video is on the horizon, said Robinson. India’s 80 million mobile users recently saw the first film produced for mobile phones, said Saleem Mobhani of Hungama Mobile. “Bollywood is made for mobile,” says Mobhan, because in every serial are 4-5 songs and in every film up to 15. In Brazil mobile operators sell 15 million ring tones a month, said Felippe Llerana, founder of Brazilian digital content provider iMusica.
China Satcom signed last week with China’s launch provider to send up a French-made broadcast satellite, Chinese news reports said. The Chinese launch contractor will tap the China Great Wall Industry to launch an Alcatel Alenia Space satellite in 2007, reports said. The satellite, ChinaSat 6B, will see use for TV and radio in the region.
China formally launched its TD-SCDMA 3G mobile standard, the Xinhua news agency reported late last week. The Ministry of Information Industry called the technology “already mature and ready for manufacturers to move ahead with production.” The paper said in the next year a standalone TD-SCDMA network will be built for compatibility with Chinese technology, and some analysts think China will issue 3G licenses during 2006.
American GDP and productivity could improve immensely if the U.S. made the same updates in the health and service sectors that it’s made in production, said Rutledge Capital Chmn. John Rutledge, former economic advisor to President Reagan. In his keynote at a U.S. Chamber of Commerce panel on revitalizing telecom, Rutledge said the realities of world capital markets offer Americans the choice of changing the rules to exploit our communications abilities “or we can learn Chinese.” He echoed a running Chamber theme, that telecom is the “nervous system” other U.S. business uses to boost profitability, and called for specific policy shifts on spectrum and franchising.
Citigroup raised its global handset shipment forecast to 911 million units in 2006 from its previous 877 million units, based mostly on strong Q4 sales numbers for handset manufacturers and better-than-expected guidance for Q1 2006. Citigroup also predicted even-stronger subscriber growth and replacement rates for the year. Most of the global markets investors had expected to slow down have remained bullish in the handset sector, Citigroup said in a report late Wed., especially the surprisingly robust N. American market.
Adding academic heft to earlier efforts, House Democrats touted their “innovation” agenda a 2nd time, but released few new details. They pilloried President Bush, saying he'll miss a self-imposed 2007 deadline on affordable broadband. They demanded Bush explain his policies on each innovation issue, including broadband and R&D, in his coming State of the Union speech. Each congressional speaker was paired with an academic panelist at a House Democratic Caucus event Thurs.
Led by growth in China, commercial telematics will have a big year in 2006, ABI Research predicted in a new report. “We expect several current developments to spell out new market opportunities,” said Frank Viquez, dir. of ABI’s transportation research practice. “For example, the boom in the trailer tracking market will draw attention to opportunities in intermodal cargo container and railcar tracking markets. Also, current consolidation among courier/third party logistics providers is fueling the need for these firms to adopt telematics solutions in order to help increase asset visibility.”
Spurred by advanced models, digital cable set-top shipments rose for the 2nd straight year worldwide, research group In-Stat said Tues. Shipments increased to 12.2 million set tops last year from 10.8 million in 2004, for the first consecutive annual gains since 2001, the group said. Continued demand in N. America for advanced or high-end boxes that included PVRs or HD capability, coupled with modestly increasing demand in Asia, fueled 2 consecutive years of growth and bodes well for more: “Demand for all types of digital cable set top boxes, especially in North America and China, is going to remain quite strong in 2006 and 2007,” said In-Stat analyst Mike Paxton. The group’s report, “Digital Cable Set Top Boxes: Demand for High-End Boxes Continues to Spur Market Growth,” also found shipments of advanced digital exceeded basic digital box shipments in 2005 for the first time. Because the average price of an advanced box is “significantly higher” than a basic digital one, worldwide revenue was expected to grow to $2.7 billion last year. Motorola and Scientific-Atlanta continue to be the leading cable set-top manufacturers, accounting for 90% of worldwide shipments through 2005’s first half.
Chinese equipment maker ZTE won a contract from China Telecom to build a next-generation fixed line network in Shanghai, which has some 10 million wireline subscribers. “The large subscriber base makes any service deployment in Shanghai very complicated,” said Huang Dabin, vice gen. mgr. of ZTE Network Div.