Looking back at mobile phone history, a lot of technological innovations were introduced with the shift from the first-generation analog mobile phone (1G) to the second-generation digital mobile phone (2G). The same thing occurred with the shift from the 2G models to the third-generation W-CDMA mobile phone (3G). During the 1G era, service providers focused mainly on voice calls. However, the introduction of i-mode technology in 1999 caused a drastic increase in data communications needs, which in turn brought about functional innovations — both in handsets and services. The introduction of 3G FOMA in 2001 opened a new page in mobile phone history. The speed-up of data communication and rapidly growing needs for memory-consuming applications raised requirements for CPU performance and created demand for an application processor to offload to the communication processor.
FOMA owes its current rapid expansion to the fact that handset performance and provided services duly met users' needs. The evolution of the mobile phone continues, picking up speed, with next-generation mobile communication technologies such as 3.5G and super 3G already on the roadmap. We must drastically accelerate development speed; otherwise we won't be able to provide in a timely manner new mobile handsets and services that satisfy customers' evolving expectations and needs. |
For the 2G-to-3G generation shift to occur rapidly in the future, it's critically important to decrease phone handset prices, especially on standard models. Those costs encompass hardware and software development costs, materials costs, and testing costs. The most effective way to reduce all these costs is to adopt a common platform. Using this system development approach, mobile phone manufacturers install software modules and users interfaces — which are specific for each manufacturer — on the same design platform. Then they package, produce and market their products to consumers as differentiated models.
Until now, mobile phone manufacturers have developed their own platforms both for hardware and software, and the costs have tended to grow to high levels. However, the adoption of a common platform will simplify and speed up the development process, while allowing each manufacturer to concentrate on adding value to enhance the individuality of its phones.
Considering just the hardware in a mobile phone, additional device integration appears to be an effective method for cutting cost, one that promotes the common platform approach. Present FOMA models are composed of separate semiconductors, such as communication processors and application processors. Until now, those chips often had special designs and relatively limited production runs. By using a common platform, a unified, integrated device can be developed based on the design of the reliable high-performance chips being used today. The resulting single-chip solution will be sophisticated, to be sure, but it will be manufactured in very high volumes, allowing attractively low device prices.
Looking at the software in a mobile phone, an effective solution for promoting the common platform is to employ a general-purpose operating system. Most conventional mobile phones have real-time OSs, with all their functional limitations. By switching to a general-purpose OS environment, application software development efficiency increases because the OS provides all of the necessary functionality. Moreover, because more software developers start writing code for that OS, there is a high potential for further cost reduction.
The adoption of a general-purpose OS will eliminate the burden of building and maintaining a development environment, too. It will also facilitate the formation of a mechanism for achieving further commonality, through the purchase of proven code modules created by independent software vendors that write applications for the OS. In addition, the introduction and spread of a common API will make it easier to share software assets. All these benefits will not only aid cost reduction efforts, but shorten the development cycle, as well. |
Although lowering prices on mobile handsets is an important task, we should not let it affect operational and functional performance or impede the further evolution of mobile phones. It's essential to strike a good overall balance. The scale merit approach is indispensable in developing a overall balanced common platform, while maintaining the original standards for platform performance and functionality. Therefore, NTT DoCoMo intends to develop foreign markets, pursuing the scale merit by going global.
From the worldwide perspective, Japan's mobile phones are very advanced and offer high levels of functionality. For instance, despite the fact that the smart phone has been making headlines abroad recently, the 900i Series and other NTT DoCoMo models existing at that time already performed equally well or better. In comparison with general needs of most foreign markets, customers in Japan demand higher functionality and quality from their mobile handsets. Their sophisticated requirements give us a valuable advantage, keeping us one step ahead in our product development. We intend use this advantage to promptly turn world-leading technologies into worldwide standards, incorporate those technologies into the common platform, and promote that platform to global mobile phone markets.
The introduction and spread of the upcoming overall balanced common platform will bring about lower prices on mobile handsets. That, in turn, will boost 3G's global sales and yield larger-scale merits. We strongly believe that this cycle of innovations will greatly contribute to increased satisfaction for mobile phone users in countries around the world. |
