PHS MoU Group Secretary General's China Trip Report


By PHS MoU Group Secretary General

     For several days from April 15, 2004, I visited Beijing and Hangzhou with Mr. Chika, TWG Chairperson, Mr. Sato, BWG Chairperson and Mr. Fujii, TWG Vice-Chairperson of the PHS MoU Group for having discussions there.

     Though it was a short visit, we could fortunately meet with the local parties concerned of China Netcom Corporation (CNC), China Telecom (CT), Ministry of Information and Industry Research Center (MIIRC), Kyocera Beijing office (Kyocera ZC), BDA China, Lucent Technologies (LT), Index China (IC), Nikkei BP Beijing local office (Nikkei BP China) and UTStarcom (UTS). So I'd like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to those who spared their busy time for our interview.

     When we arrived at Beijing airport, cotton laid thickly over the pavement like a snow. Beijing's development is really astonishing and each time I visited there, I felt that the streets seemed to have changed much. The speed of that development seemed to be too fast for the lifeline infrastructure to catch up, however, people's smiling face looked like that they have any confidence to solve that.

     It may be no need to emphasize, the PHS has been developed its basic technology and introduced first in Japan and brought over to China and getting spread rapidly in other Asian countries as well after its remarkable growth in China. This technology is well recognized as a symbol of the friendship in not only Asian but also South American or other developing countries as well. Unlike the other cellular phones, the PHS is quite economical and friendly wireless communications service for developing countries because it can provide the service with a small investment based on its small cell size and good availability of the existing telephone infrastructure. Nowadays, thanks to China especially the PHS has become the very leading air protocol used by more than 50 millions users worldwide.

     PHS data communications service is becoming a mainstream in Japan, however, in China, its remarkable growth stemmed from the service category by extension to the fixed telephone service.

     For CNC waiting for stock listing too, it's confirmed that the PHS could be an important service as well as the broadband policy and we felt that it's necessary for PHS MoU to give more substantial support to that. Especially, as for Cell Station (CS) siting know-how, most experienced Japanese PHS operator DDI POCKET is now making manual by disclosing its own know-how to teach where and how to site the CS would be most effective and CNC people showed much interest in that. The PHS MoU is also planning to hold such seminar shortly.

     In China, 3G wireless license is supposed to be granted soon, however, market sharing with the PHS as an extension of the fixed telephone seemed to be a big issue. In Japan, based on similar experience, we succeeded in solving that technically by providing a guard-band so that we are willing to provide persons who request with such experience as the PHS MoU.

     The background of the Chinese people's slight worry about the above, there seems to be some skepticism whether the PHS which is not registered as 3G protocol or paid no attention in Western countries is promising in the future or not. For that, 3G is basically an IMT-2000, in other words, it's been developed within the ITU-R framework ruled by Western countries and at that time there seemed to be an atmosphere of one protocol by one country to be granted. Once it's opened up, there were multiple applications from the U.S., however, Japan dared not make an application in order to prevent a confusion I heard.

     PHS has enough capability which covers 3G's requirements as well so that it may be a measure to make an application for 3G protocol, however, it would be a waste of effort considering the fact that an investigation of 4G has already launched.

     Further, it seems to be still not known that the PHS is rather "beyond 3G" technology in terms of the makings of its full-IP, broadband data speed, high frequency efficiency by TDD (Time Division Duplex) etc.

     PHS's most recent development subjects half-rate, improving data transmission speed and efficiency etc. are progressing steadily. With this system to produce more profit than the other cellular systems can be built up. Any further developments of this will be reported to you in the future.

     By the way, this time we visited Hangzhou as well. There we visited one of the PHS network venders UTStarcom for an information exchange. Hangzhou is a very beautiful city having Xi-hu in its central area. The development of this city is also astonishing and everywhere was under construction. Chinese food served in every restaurant was not so oily and very good for Japanese, however, duck's leg, tongue etc. seemed to be unsuitable for timid people. I think that there will be more visits between China and Japan in the future as direct flight opens. The Buddhist pagoda called "Lai" on the lakeside of Xi-hu was really magnificent. I was deeply impressed with escalators and elevators (lifts) provided for old and young visitors. However, I was shamed to know that in the past days this pagoda was set on fire by the Japanese pirates. I only hope that the PHS will act as a mediator for two countries' friendship improvement in the future based on the past valuable lesson.

     Many young engineers of UTStarcom were actively developing the new products and investigations of the new standards were waiting for being taken up. I think that it's our important role as the PHS MoU to disclose each developed technology and to make every person who has an interest in the PHS business accessible to that. What's important is an understanding of the possibility of many problems if there's no unified basic standards and it's common sense in the telecommunications industry. It's slightly different situation from the PC industry. Generally, both engineers and companies are apt to monopolize the technologies developed with much labor by their own specific standards, however, such may prevent the market growth. It's necessary to open up and activate the market as best as they can using friendly competition of the companies. Especially, such is required for the telecommunications industry.

     Though at present many Ad Hocs have been active under the PHS MoU's TWG, however, there emerged a request to set up two new Ad Hocs more at this meeting. Any further details will be reported by the TWG and every member of the PHS MoU is allowed to participate in the TWG on condition that he (she) accepts a voluntary work. There will be no progress unless the TWG works hard to make standards by many volunteers' support. So that your positive participation would be very much appreciated. Though this time we visited UTStarcom only, however, we'd like to have a discussion with other network suppliers shortly to activate the TWG and to promote the standards unification and standardization. The PHS MoU is an organization for you so that your participation is really significant.

     By the way, the following points have become clear for the PHS MoU as a result of this time's visit to China.

(1) To study urgently in China the establishment of the PHS MoU Group China chapter.
(2) To hold self-planning seminars for CT and CNC.
(3) To make a presentation on PHS technology on request.
(4) To have a technical information exchange meeting with ZTE and LT as well.
(5) TWG joint meeting is to be held from June 28, 2004 for three days in Xiamen.
(6) The General Meeting is being planned to be held in around August, 2004.