marketing brochure.
Inter-faith skirmishes over the ersatz notion of the Best Way Forward persist, and this further complicates issues for the market. Regulators in Asia tend to be for-ward-thinking with regards to the role new technology plays in defining future licensing environments (with the continued exception of those that enable VoIP, but–for once–I won’t get into that in this column). At a recent telecoms roundtable run by the Economist (disclosure-a-go-go: your humble correspondent was the Chairperson) M.H. Au, Hong Kong’s Director-General of Telecommunications, pointed out that the central responsibility of–and the chief challenge for–policy makers in Asia’s next generation is clear: “Regulation should not impede the deployment of any new technologies,” he proclaimed, and reiter-
Fall in Hong Kong. A smidgen of cepted as a broadband wireless solu- ated his technology-neutral stance. But coolness in the air sends each of us claw- tion by the global wireless community? often side-stepping technology-specific ing under our beds for hermetically Check. Korea’s WiBro ready for export? decisions isn’t enough, as M.H. and his sealed garment boxes, to extract those Check. Asia’shigh speed data wireless fu- fellow regulators at Hong Kong’s Office sweater-vests and mohair car-coats we’ve ture? Let’s check. of the Telecommunications Regulatory been dying to wear since we got back to Those luscious sweaters and car-coats Authority likely discovered with its re-town in August. People start getting a bit we crave are only really needed a couple cent public consultation on the issuance checklist-y in November, looking to get weeks out of the year in quasi-tropical of new wireless broadband licenses. Even things done in a rare month of produc- Hong Kong. So too, the sheer number of though specific solutions were not pre-tivity unsullied by public holidays, before next-gen wireless technologies available scribed, 3G operators cried foul as they things start their inexorable spiral into to the well-dressed Asian telco is a bit of saw their potential mobile data turf in-end-of-year cheer. Thus it was with brisk Too Much. Too Much, in that there still vaded. Unfortunately, even the most for-efficiency that attendees swirled through aren’t too many reasons for all this high- ward-thinking policy environments still the 3G World Congress here last week, speed wireless bandwidth investment, have legacy frameworks to deal with; it sprinting through display stands to en- although that is changing (and more on will take some time before such laughably sure they ticked off sightings of the lat- that later). Added to this is Too Much quaint distinctions as ‘fixed’ and ‘mobile’ est offerings from the next generation Choice, in that the multiple roads to the are worked out of our regulatory system. wireless frontier. Alcatel successfully future of mobile data are causing many trials IPTV over an HSDPA connection? carriers and regulators to postpone their Mobility Nobility
Check. China’s 3G standard, TD-SCDMA, journey because they simply can’t decide Regulation aside, there are at best mud-successfully rehabilitated and fully ac- which way to take. Every time another dled–and in most cases conflicting–per-
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