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Tim Cook spotted at China Mobile's headquarters
Apple's acting CEO Tim Cook was spotted at the headquarters of China Mobile today, lending credence to recent rumors that Apple is in talks to bring the iPhone to the carrier. China Mobile is the largest mobile phone operator in the world, with over 600 million subscribers, so bringing the iPhone to the carrier is seen as an important step for Apple's growth in the Asian market. As noted by MICGadget, a reporter from First Financial Daily was sitting in the the lobby of China Mobile earlier today when she spotted Tim Cook flanked by seven to eight people. She quickly snapped the picture you see here. From her blog: This morning, around 10, Apple COO Tim Cook is spotted in the lobby of China Mobile's HQ, accompanied by 7-8 people. Probably Cook is talking with executives from China Mobile to discuss bilateral cooperation for the iPhone. Both China and America flags are seen in the lobby, and Cook seems to be happy. A month ago we told you about rumors that Apple and China Mobile had reached a consensus on a 4G iPhone that would support China Mobile's TD-LTE 4G technology. At the time, sources said that negotiations weren't complete. Given that Tim Cook was spotted in China Mobile's headquarters today, it seems apparent that, at the very least, negotiations are ongoing, if not almost wrapped up in time for the next iPhone launch this fall.
Apple interested in building 4G LTE iPhone "early"
Apple may be looking to build a TD-LTE iPhone earlier than expected, according to a comment from China Mobile Chairman Wang Jianzhou. Jianzhou singled out Steve Jobs while speaking about the possibility of an LTE iPhone outside a conference meeting on Friday. The chairman said "Jobs has expressed his interest in an LTE iPhone and is willing to start the development at an early date." China Mobile, the largest mobile operator in China as well as the world, is preparing to launch large-scale tests of its TD-LTE network in select Chinese cities including Shanghai and Hangzhou. LTE or Long Term Evolution is the next generation in cellular technology that promises significantly faster mobile broadband speeds. It is commonly referred to as 4G. These upcoming tests are the precursor to a full-scale launch expected by the end of the year. An earlier demonstration produced download speeds of 80 Mbps, which is 20x faster than current cellular network technology. LTE is poised to explode in China in the next several years. IHS iSuppli predicts capital spending on LTE will double to US$100 million in 2011 and balloon to $1.3 billion by 2014. China's total mobile user base has grown to over 869 million subscribers and is the largest in the world. While its mobile subscriber numbers are high, China's mobile phone penetration is relatively low at 64%. Whether or not Apple will be "early" with a China Mobile iPhone remains to be seen, but this untapped market presents a unique opportunity for growth that Apple would not want to ignore.
LTE iPhone noise builds steam with a grain of Wang
Has it got the fourgees? Well, if you're talking about Apple's iPhone and believe what you hear from China Mobile Chairman Wang Jianzhou, it very soon will. Following in the well publicized footsteps of Verizon CEO Dan Mead, Mr. Jianzhou tells us that Steve Jobs himself "has expressed his interest in an LTE iPhone and is willing to start the development at an early date." Of course, the crux of the issue will be in ascertaining how early "an early date" might be, but it's not completely out of the realm of reason to believe that Apple may already be cranking away on an LTE-capable iPhone 5. We all know how much Steve loves to compare measurements with the competition and the iPhone's lack of a fourth G will probably be driving him mad by the time the summer rolls around. Either way, we've now got two extremely senior dudes claiming LTE is on Apple's roadmap.
Sony Ericsson CTO: first LTE device coming 'pretty soon,' also considering Android tablets
Back in late 2008, Ericsson boldly predicted that 2012 will be the year of LTE; and fast forward to today, one year shy of the big one-two, said company's joint venture with Sony is already teasing its first LTE device. In a recent interview with Fierce Wireless, Sony Ericsson CTO Jan Uddenfeldt talked about SE's renewed focus on the US market, and how its relationship with Google helped securing its first-ever deal with Verizon. While emphasizing that SE's been in the CDMA business for years in Japan, Uddenfeldt also referred to the TD-LTE demonstration with ST-Ericsson and China Mobile at MWC, which featured a prototype LTE device developed by his own gang. Looks like SE's all set to enter the game, but the question is when will we see its first LTE device on the market? Uddenfeldt said "pretty soon," and he further fuels speculation by mentioning a potential collaboration with Sony on some Android tablets (maybe the S1?). Oh, such a teaser this man is. Update: Swapped in an image of the prototype looking a bit too much like a 2007 UMPC above.
China Mobile says Apple to support TD-LTE
In an interview with Chinese news portal Sina, China Mobile's Chairman Wang Jianzhou was quoted (Chinese) as saying that Apple would get behind the carrier's next-gen TD-LTE network technology: "Apple has its own problems to deal with and has many things to develop, and currently TD development is not on its timetable," he said. "Apple has been clear that it will support TD-LTE ... These two years we have been discussing the issue. The situation is currently moving forward step by step." If Apple has indeed thrown its support behind TD-LTE, it would be a significant boost for China Mobile as it could prompt other handset makers to follow Apple's lead. Up until now, China Unicom has been the only carrier to officially carry the iPhone. China Mobile has taken some dubious measures to keep customers from jumping on the unicorn Unicom, including providing online instructions (Chinese) for how to activate an iPhone on China Mobile's network, as well as providing SIM card cutting services at many of the company's outlets. Of course, there's much to gain from Apple's point of view as well. The company's recent earnings call showed significant growth in China and the rest of Asia, and Tim Cook indicated that the company would focus more resources there. [Via Reuters]
Motorola shows off world's first TD-LTE USB dongle
Though frequency division LTE has won the hearts and minds of most of the Western world's carriers, TD-LTE is emerging as a potential force to be reckoned with in the long-term 4G picture on account of its comparably low deployment cost and the fact that it can used in smaller contiguous blocks of spectrum, while still seamlessly handing off to and from FD-LTE airwaves. Motorola -- probably owing in part to its strong presence in China -- seems to be at or near the forefront of TD-LTE development, reinforcing its standing this week with the news that it's developed the world's first USB modem capable of running on compatible networks. Moto's demonstrating an HD video wall, remote monitoring apps, and (naturally) high-speed internet browsing at a TD-LTE showcase in Shanghai, an event that even some North American bigwigs might be paying close attention to. Fragmentation of 4G technology is always a cause for concern, but if this ultimately means we can use spectrum that otherwise wouldn't be prime enough to upgrade, we're all for it.
Sprint, Clearwire among companies asking for TD-LTE standard in WiMAX spectrum
Clearwire has made it crystal clear that it isn't taking a "WiMAX or die" approach to 4G -- and frankly, it couldn't afford to, considering that the infrastructure suppliers and hardware manufacturers could easily continue their trend toward shunning the next-gen underdog. What's interesting, though, is that the company now appears to be taking a very active role in developing an LTE-based standard that could supplant WiMAX in its 2.6GHz spectrum should the need arise. Along with Motorola, Huawei, ZTE, Cisco, Nokia Siemens, Alcatel-Lucent, and -- surprise, surprise -- Clearwire partner Sprint, the company is asking the 3GPP to define a standard for running TD-LTE in the 2.6GHz slot. Unlike the more commonly-used FD-LTE -- the standard Verizon is using, among others -- TD-LTE operates unpaired, meaning it can operate in slimmer chunks of spectrum than its counterpart. Asking for a standard is clearly a far cry from actually building out a network, but it's interesting to note that Clearwire and Sprint alike both have their eyes firmly fixed on an LTE-based technology if the WiMAX industry packs it in.
China Mobile, Nokia Siemens team up to show first TD-LTE femtocell
LTE's being designed to support deployment in both frequency division (FD-LTE) and time division (TD-LTE) modes depending on bandwidth allocation and the legacy network that's being upgraded, and in China Mobile's case, they're looking at possibly rolling out a mix -- TD-LTE makes for an elegant and inexpensive upgrade path when you're starting with another tech with "TD" in its name, TD-SCDMA. Carriers around the world are looking to lean heavily on femtocells to boost LTE footprint out of the gate, and to that end, China Mobile has teamed up with Nokia Siemens -- a company that's been pushing a number of "world's firsts" lately -- to show off the first functional TD-LTE femtocell demo by streaming video over a base station in the carrier's labs. It's still a ways off yet before customers will actually have these tucked away in the corners of their homes, but it's a step in the right direction.
T-Mobile likely to skip HSPA+, head straight to LTE
When you know what's just around the bend, biting on the best the world has now is that much more difficult. Just ask T-Mobile International, who told Unstrung at the World Telecoms Conference in London that it would probably bypass the whole HSPA+ thing and look straight to LTE. More specifically, CTO Joachim Horn noted that "if I need to invest into more hardware, I think it's better to start early [with LTE]. LTE is a more future-oriented technology." He did admit that T-Mobile would "deploy HSPA as long as there is no hardware replacement necessary," but that means the current 3G network would only ever hit 14.4Mbit/sec (at most). Interestingly enough, Horn also showed interest in TD-LTE, which China Mobile is currently backing as a migration path from TD-SCDMA. At any rate, T-Mob users should probably hope LTE gets here in a hurry, particularly now that you know what you're waiting for.[Via Electronista]
