The Hindu Business Line : Vendors support CDMA players

CODE Division Multiple Access (CDMA) based operators on Monday produced letters from leading telecom equipment vendors in support of their stance that there was no CDMA handset or equipment that would be compatible to work in 800 Mhz along with 1800 Mhz.

The vendors including LG Electronics, Motorola, Samsung, Ericsson, Lucent, Nortel and Qualcomm have said that they had dual band equipment that can be used in a network using 800 Mhz along with 1900 Mhz. The 1900 frequency band has been a moot point of disagreement between cellular firms using the Global System for Mobile (GSM) technology and CDMA-based operators. While GSM operators have been saying that the 1900 Mhz be reserved only for third generation services, CDMA players want additional spectrum in the same frequency band on grounds that equipment was not available that would be compatible between the currently used band of 800 Mhz and 1800 Mhz.

While cellular firms say that CDMA operators be confined to the 1800 Mhz, CDMA players want to get into 1900 Mhz.

The Association of Unified Telecom Service Providers representing CDMA players said that the claims of the cellular operators that CDMA handsets were widely available for the 1800 Mhz band has been proven to be false. "When the fourth cellular operator was given the 1800 Mhz band even we faced problem with no dual band phones available. But vendors developed a handset quickly. Similar thing can be done for CDMA players as well," said Mr T.V. Ramachandran, Director General, COAI.