China Mobile Waits on Qualcomm Chip for TD-SCDMA iPhone
Sina Tech, 6/27/12
China Mobile (NYSE: CHL; 0941.HK) chairman Xi Guohua disclosed recently that the company's timetable for offering a TD-SCDMA iPhone is not dependent on decisions made by either Apple or China Mobile, but rather hinges on when Qualcomm can provide a chip to Apple that supports TD-SCDMA. At the same time, Xi emphasized that China Mobile is even more interested in working towards the successful completion of its TD-LTE network, which the iPhone can use. Qualcomm released a new LTE chip in mid-June, but did not integrate TD-SCDMA, as China Mobile had hoped. As early as last year, leaders in the industry called upon Qualcomm to work on TD-SCDMA, but the company has not launched a TD-SCDMA chip to date. Industry insiders maintain that for Qualcomm, TD-LTE chip integration is not a problem, but integrating the TD-SCDMA standard is more difficult.
According to Apple's usual practice, every iPhone standard is backwards compatible; the 3G standard iPhone is compatible with 2G, and the 4G standard iPhone is compatible with both 3G and 2G. The iPhone 4S uses Qualcomm chips, compatible with GSM, WCDMA, CDMA, and CDMA2000 EV-DO.
Keywords: Xi Guohua China Mobile iPhone timetable wireless 4G Qualcomm 3G Apple CHL TD-LTE TD-SCDMA 0941.HK smartphone handset handset chip
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