iMode & 3G -- To U.S. Shores Sooner Than We Thought!

NTT's DoCoMo is the company that created "iMode," the "always on," higher-speed pocket Internet service that has taken Japan by storm, and that has propelled DoCoMo to becoming the fastest-growing ISP in the world! It is also now the third-largest company in the world (behind Microsoft and GE) worth $366 billion, and it's expected, according to a March 12 Nua editorial (http://www.nua.ie/surveys/analysis/weekly_editorial/archives/issue1no169.html), to "shortly surpass AOL as the world's biggest ISP." All of this because they brought the Internet to the pockets of Japan in an easy and aesthetic and fun to use way. (Does this remind you of what kindled the Web -- when NCSA's Mosaic browser first brought those same attributes to the wired Web?) Well, iMode is now getting ready to leap from Japanese shores, and other new, even faster pocket data technologies are also getting ready to appear. The result, I think, is that the way we think about access to our data will never be the same!

"Early next year" is when 3G (Third Generation mobile phone service) will begin showing up on U.S. shores by a collaboration between NTT DoCoMo and AT&T Wireless, according to Kiyoyuki Tsujimura in the March 14 Washington Post (http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/business/latestap/A2503-2001Mar14.html). "iMode" will begin its U.S. implementation in Seattle.

"Cellphones in the United States and Europe are still like 13-inch black-and-white TV sets," [Tsujimura] said, showing his folding i-mode phone. "There's a huge gap in technology. People see these color displays and are stunned."

Indeed, with iMode's anticipated 3G implementation scheduled to go live in Japan this May, "video, audio, and other heavy-duty transmissions" are headed toward our pockets.

Interestingly (and somewhat unexpectedly), other U.S. companies also appear poised to leap into 3G -- the March 16 News.com (http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200-5160757.html) reports that Sprint PCS "plans to be the first to launch 3G services [about 144 kilobytes/second] in the United States, with a limited offering at the end of this year..." The March 20 PCWorld.com (http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,45071,00.asp) goes on to describe the rest of Sprint's four-phase 3G implementation:

"In early 2003 Sprint PCS will move to the second stage in its 3G transition and offer data speeds of up to 307 kbps. By late 2003 data transmission speeds will reach up to 2.4 mbps, and in early 2004 transmission speeds for voice and data will hit between 3 mbps and 5 mbps."

Verizon, as well, plans to get into the 3G game sooner than many had expected; they have just let a $5 billion contract to Lucent for a planned coast-to-coast 3G deployment, beginning this year. Their system will use an extension to current CDMA technology, with a name that just rolls off the tongue -- "CDMA2000*3G1XRTT". Data transmission is expected to be ten-times faster than today, or around 192 kilobits/second. (http://www.lucent.com/press/0301/010319.nsa.html)

By the way, if you're just a little confused as to exactly what "3G" actually is, don't feel alone. It's confusing because "3G" is often used as an umbrella-term for high speed wireless data -- it doesn’t explicitly refer to one of the many competing standards such as W-CDMA, CDMA2000, and Edge. If you'd like to delve deeper into the world of 3G, check out ZDNet-UK's "3G primmer," at http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/specials/2000/08/road_2_3g/welcome-3g.html).

The end result though, once the standards battles are settled and the massive implementation is complete, will be a significant change to how and when and where we expect to be able to access a world of multimedia data. And it will also morph the things in our pockets in new and fascinating directions -- consider these concept models, from several manufacturers, in ZDNet's Concept Gallery (http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/specials/2000/08/road_2_3g/):

Well, we'll have to wait and see if these wireless carriers can meet these optimistic projections. But considering that Strategy Analytics expects 1.7 billion people, or 26% of the people on this planet to have a cell phone by 2006 (http://www.strategyanalytics.com/), high-speed wireless access, by whatever name and by whichever standard, is not a trend that any of us wants to ignore!

This is going to change a lot of rules...

This is an excerpt from the "Rapidly Changing Face of Computing, " a free weekly multimedia technology journal written by Jeffrey R. Harrow, Principal Member of Technical Staff for the Corporate Strategy group at Compaq. A more extensive version of this discussion, as well as others around the innovations and trends of contemporary computing and the technologies that drive them, are available at http://www.compaq.com/rcfoc . Jeff's opinions do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Compaq. The RCFoC is a service of, and Copyright 2000, Compaq Computer Corp."