Texas Instruments continues to put its weight behind video conferencing on the cellular handset. Indeed, Mike Yonker, CTO of cellular systems in TI's wireless terminals business unit, believes it will be a strong driver for the 3G market.

"For the 3G networks that have been deployed and seen success, what I've heard is that they've seen video conferencing as the first app that people think about when they think about 3G," he said in an interview . 

TI partner DoCoMo in Japan, which uses the Dallas-based company's OMAP technology in its 3G W-CDMA phones, has been active in video over the handset in Asia for years, Yonker said.

"The reality is in Japan there are literally new metrics being created as a result of some of the applications available," he said. "Before, maybe the only two ways we would measure the performance of a phone were talk time and standby time. Now, there's actually video talk time on DoCoMo phones."

TI and DoCoMo are not alone in the emerging 3G market. Recently, Intel and Symbian announced the joint development of a reference platform for a new class of 3G devices based on the Symbian OS and Intel’s XScale technology. Qualcomm, a player in the market from 3G's birth, in October announced its $19 million cash buy of Spike Technologies, a Milpitas, Calif.-based semiconductor design services company that complements its work in the space.

Meanwhile, TI's latest major step toward 3G usage remains in the video-over-handset arena. OMAP-based Hollywood, its single digital TV chip for cell phones that will capture 24 to 30 frames per second and allow users to watch live broadcasts, is expected to sample in 2006.

Custom solutions like Hollywood, pushed by applications like video -- not standard technologies --  are what will bring the 3G market to full speed, Yonker believes.

"The reality is, even if you look at the 2.5G market today, we're 50 percent of the standard chipset market. But the standard chipset market is still a smaller portion of the overall market for semiconductors. The custom solutions still dominate."

TI's expectations for the market are high. The company predicts 3G-handset shipment growth from about 240 million in 2004 to 440 million in 2008, 415 million of which will be W-CDMA handsets.

"After the hype of 3G a few years ago, it became sort of a forbidden word for a while. But now it is really coming around to delivering on the promise," Yonker said. "We'll see a couple of years from now the difference between a 3G phone and a 2.5G phone will be the better applications and that will drive the transition a lot."

By: DocMemory
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