Insider: WLAN and 3G to Converge

NEW YORK -- There's a cold, hard inevitability about the convergence of WLAN and 3G mobile, but the business case that will drive this integration forward has split the wireless industry – with VOIP the primary cause of the rift, according to a new report from the subscription research service Unstrung Insider.

The report, entitled Converge This! WLAN-3G Mobility, analyzes the business case, the service case, and the technical case (with reference to standards and handsets) for the integration of 802.11 wireless LAN with mobile network services.

"The major issue dominating the sector is how, and whether or not, VOIP calls over wireless LAN should be integrated into the mobile network call model," says the report's author, Unstrung Insider Chief Analyst Gabriel Brown. "Offloading calls to VOIP has its attractions, but operators are lukewarm on subsidizing handsets that could be used to bypass their networks."

The resolution of this issue is critical to the ongoing integration of multiple radio access networks, including WiMax, into a single converged core network. "Rather than straightforward VOIP offload, converged applications and rich-call services – data services over an IMS core – represent the best long-term opportunity for 802.11-to-3G convergence," adds Brown.

Among the report's key findings:

Vendors analyzed in this report: Avaya Inc. (NYSE: AV); Broadcom Corp. (Nasdaq: BRCM); Cambridge Silicon Radio plc (London: CSR); Cicero Networks Ltd.; Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ); Motorola Inc. (NYSE: MOT); NEC Corp. (Nasdaq: NIPNY; Tokyo: 6701); Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK); Proxim Corp. (Nasdaq: PROX); Qualcomm Inc. (Nasdaq: QCOM); Research In Motion Ltd. (RIM) (Nasdaq: RIMM; Toronto: RIM); Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (Korea: SEC); and Texas Instruments Inc. (NYSE: TXN).

Service providers featured in this report: BT Group plc (NYSE: BT; London: BTA); Cingular Wireless LLC; mmO2 plc (NYSE/London: OOM); NTT DoCoMo Inc. (NYSE: DCM); Orange SA (London/Paris: OGE); Skype Technologies SA; TeliaSonera AB (Nasdaq: TLSN); T-Mobile International AG; Vodafone Group plc (NYSE: VOD); and Vonage Holdings Corp.

Converge This! WLAN-3G Mobility is available as part of an annual subscription (12 monthly issues) to Unstrung Insider, priced at $1,350. Individual reports are available for $900. To subscribe, please visit: www.unstrung.com/insider.

For additional information, to request a free executive summary of the report, or for details of multi-user licensing options, please contact:

Jeff Claudino
Sales Manager
Insider Research Services
619-229-9940
[email protected]

Members of the media may request review copies from:

Gabriel Brown
Chief Analyst
Insider Research Services
+44-207-701-9330
[email protected]