Qualcomm Plans To Offer 3G USB Ports For Rs.3500
The United States based makers of the CDMA platform, Qualcomm said that it plans to offer chips for 3G telecom services at ultra-low prices in India. The company plans to offer the Internet Access Device at Rs.8000 and a USB port-device priced at Rs.3500 for accessing high-speed wireless broadband Internet on PCs and laptops.
Mr Kanwalinder Singh, President, Qualcomm India and South Asia told Business Line said
“We are ready for 3G. We have the devices, and using our single chip solution we have been able to arrive at a price point that is suited to the Indian market. Once the policy is announced and operators start rolling out 3G services, we will make sure that consumers are able to take benefit of this technology,”
In India, the USB-port based mobile internet cards have been a huge hit. The cards, available on CDMA platforms are available on Reliance and Tata Indicom. The number of such cards in India is expected to be around 5 million.
Commenting on this, Singh further added,
“Our success with CDMA-2000 based USB ports has proved that there is a demand for wireless data access devices. We will replicate that success in the 3G segment by pricing the USB port at less than Rs 3,500,” .
The company expects the USB-port based HSDPA technology to be launched in fourth quarter of 2008.
Apart from the USB-port based cards, the company has plans to enable people to surf the Internet without using the laptops or PCs. The device, will be priced at Rs.8000.
Qualcomm is in talks with several carriers to offer branded handsets. Qualcomm does not makes the handsets itself. It just develops the technology and licenses it to other carriers. So far, it’s biggest revenues was from the licensing of CDMA handsets. But with the development of the low-cost 3G chips, it can claim to have a major chunk of its revenue flowing form GSM operators as well. 3G will be deployed by GSM operators, too and Qualcomm claims to have the chip for both, CDMA, as well as WCDMA(Wideband-CDMA), which is a derivative of GSM, and thus we can expect quite a few players using Qualcomm’s chips to power their services.
Qualcomm, was losing grounds in many markets. Its CDMA-technology, although technologically superior than GSM, was on the verge of being abandoned by many carriers. Primarily because of its high licensing fees. We know Anil Ambani had a meeting with Qualcomm officials, where the company tried to pursue to continue using CDMA platform, but refused to lower the licensing fee. Anil, finally ended applying to, and winning, a GSM license. India is always in need of low-cost devices. Let’s see if Qualcomm can win back some lost customers.
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I really look forward to have this in my arsenal as soon as possible. Though I think vodafone already has launched something that says 3G USB…but it’s priced too high.