China Finally Issues 3G Licenses

from the not-sure-we-really-believe-this,-but-oh-well... dept

Chinese authorities have apparently finally issued licenses for mobile operators there to operate 3G networks, following years of delays. The country had been talking about getting 3G going since 2003 or so, but its tech protectionist bent saw it forced to take delay after delay until it could finally get its homegrown TD-SCDMA standard into acceptable working condition, while 3G networks built on existing, widely accepted industry standards flowered elsewhere in the world. It's great that China's offered up an alternative to the WCDMA and CDMA2000 standards, and one that might not carry some of the same intellectual property burdens as those two, translating into lower costs. But by this point, any such benefit the standard might offer has been rendered fairly meaningless by the long delay in getting it to market -- meaning China's protectionism will probably have done more to hurt the country's position in technology than to help it.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: 3g, china


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    Annony, 13 Jan 2009 @ 2:48am

    Considering that USA does not have proper 3G coverage as yet in 2009 why should China be held up as an example of not yet having 3G networks. Other countries are working on 4G the US is already behnd

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    Mike (profile), 13 Jan 2009 @ 6:40am

    Re:

    Considering that USA does not have proper 3G coverage as yet in 2009 why should China be held up as an example of not yet having 3G networks

    I think you missed the point. China hadn't even issued the licenses to offer 3G. That's *way* behind. The complaint isn't that they don't yet have 3G, but that they so dragged their feet in even letting such a network be set up.

    As for the US... that's an odd statement. It actually has pretty decent 3G coverage, and was significantly ahead of many other countries.

    And, when you say that other countries are working on 4G while the US is behind, perhaps you haven't noticed that the US carriers are all launching 4G solutions, and Sprint has already started rolling it out.

    Details.

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.