In the next few months, users will be able to choose from four
3G data services, each of which has benefits and drawbacks that
could affect your business
The arrival of the first 3G data services in the UK will lead to
many enterprises evaluating the technology as a serious business
option, so what is available now and how much does it cost?
The beginning of the year saw Vodafone launch its 3G data cards
which are inserted into laptops to give users access over both GPRS
and 3G networks. It offers a combination of networks because
Vodafone's 3G coverage is only available to about a third of the UK
population, mainly in big cities. Vodafone promises its 3G coverage
will reach 50% of the population this autumn, but only 80% of the
population will be able to access its 3G services by 2007.
Although 3G may be available in a particular area, it does not mean
it will always be available. You might have to rely on GPRS, which
is about seven times slower.
Vodafone is facing competition on price and availability from
Orange, which went live with its 3G data card earlier this
month.
Price is right
Orange's cheaper service is available to 65% of the UK population,
again, mainly in the big cities. Both companies are selling data
cards which offer a connection speed of up to 384kbps on 3G
networks and slower speeds on GPRS networks.
The entry-level price of the Orange service is £10 a month for up
to 7Mbytes of data sent or received, going up to £75 a month for up
to 1Gbyte of data. This compares to Vodafone's entry-level price of
£11.75 for 5Mbytes and top price of £100 for 500Mbytes of
data.
Where users stray over their monthly data thresholds, all the
Orange packages also charge less for each extra megabyte of data
sent or received.
One advantage of the Vodafone service is that the company currently
has more 3G international roaming agreements than Orange: Vodafone
has 10 and Orange only had three at launch. As the world's largest
telecoms operator, Vodafone also has many more GPRS roaming
agreements than Orange.
For international business travellers therefore, Vodafone is so far
the most convenient service.
Vodafone has not revealed how many users it has for its 3G network,
and an Orange spokesman said the company will not discuss its usage
targets.
T-Mobile launched its 3G data card last week, but will initially
only offer speeds of up to 128kbps, although this will eventually
rise to 384kbps. The T-Mobile package costs £199 for the card and
software and £70 per month for unlimited data.
O2 said it will launch its 3G data card this autumn.
Office integration
An advantage of the T-Mobile card is that it will interface with
Wi-Fi networks. T-Mobile users can access more than 500 wireless
hotspots at Starbucks coffee shops, motorway service stations,
airports and hotels at more than 1mbps - and all part of its £70
per month subscription.
However, Vodafone users may have the advantage in terms of
connectivity into corporate applications. It has introduced
Citrix's Metaframe thin-client software onto its 3G network, to
allow mobile workers to access high-bandwidth applications such as
enterprise resource planning and customer relationship management
on the move.
Citrix Metaframe allows users to see a mirror image of their main
corporate desktop from any location. Metaframe can already be used
on GPRS networks, but with the 3G network, users will be able to
download files and access databases considerably faster.
The cost of using Metaframe is £49.50 a user per month for 50Mbytes
of data, as part of a three-year contract. The price also includes
the wireless card but there is a £100 set-up fee for each user. For
this price organisations will also have their servers configured to
allow them to be accessed by Vodafone's cards.
Kevin Bland, head of Citrix mobile business development, said, "The
key is convergence between technologies. We already have
convergence between GPRS and 3G, and we will see Wi-Fi networks
interfacing with these two to offer an even better roaming
experience to users."
It is not clear yet what T-Mobile will make available to users who
need similar server configuration help to support both mobile
networks and wireless Lans, and at what price.
Drawbacks
Analyst firm Ovum said it will still be a number of years before
European mobile operators consider 3G as their main line of
business. It believes the technology is not yet ready to support
mass market adoption since devices are in short supply and services
will continue to be priced at levels which are only attractive to
premium or high-volume users until the 3G infrastructure has
stabilised.
There will be about 6.6 million 3G connections in western Europe by
the end of 2004, according to Ovum. And though most operators will
have launched 3G by then, their networks will be incomplete. This
2004 take-up figure will be just 2% of the total mobile connections
across the continent. However, the long-term picture is not so
gloomy. Ovum expects to see 3G connections rise to over 36% of
connections - or 130 million - by 2008.
Questions remain about the reliability of the handsets though - or
the networks depending who you listen to - particularly in terms of
the "hand-off" between 2G and 3G networks. This is supposed to be
seamless.
When a 3G signal is too weak, a GPRS network is supposed to
automatically pick up the connection. But there have been
complaints among users of the UK's first 3G phone service -
Hutchison's consumer service 3 - that connections can be lost as a
result of the hand-off.
A seamless hand-off is also promised with a 3G data card, but the
card may not necessarily choose the GPRS option instead of a
heavily used, or weak, 3G service. People have found that the only
way to change networks is to log off and log on again, and hope a
better 3G or GPRS signal is found.
As 3G develops in the UK it is likely many such teething problems
will be fixed. Greater choice will mean better prices for services
and a variety of options tailored to the corporate user.
Symbian dominates the mobile device market
The dominant 2.5G smartphone operating system in the UK is
Symbian, which is used on devices from major handset manufacturers,
including Nokia, Sony Ericsson, and Samsung. The alternative
Microsoft Windows Mobile operating system is mainly used in
Orange's SPV handset family. It is unlikely that Microsoft will
be able to immediately extend this take-up as a result of 3G
though. Duncan Ledwith, head of Microsoft Windows Mobile UK, said,
"To date Microsoft has been focusing on enabling operators to drive
business value on the existing 2.5G networks." Orange has
announced that its first batch of 3G phones will be from Sony
Ericsson, which will probably run the Symbian operating system.
Beyond the novelty of running Windows across all devices in a
corporate IT environment from datacentre servers to mobile phones,
end-users should not be faced with a taxing operating system
choice. Jessica Figueras, an analyst at Ovum, said, "It should
not really matter that much to users which system is used as all
the major operating systems can be interfaced with Microsoft
enterprise servers to gain access to Microsoft Office applications,
including e-mail, contacts, and diary." She said there are only
about 450,000 phones worldwide using Windows Mobile, as opposed to
6.5 million using Symbian. RIM's Blackberry is another device that
will not set the 3G world alight. Many enterprise users are already
using the Blackberry for e-mail, contacts and calendar over 2.5G
networks and this may not change. A spokeswoman for the company
said, "The Blackberry offers a high-quality service on GSM/GPRS
networks, and all the applications that corporations are looking to
mobilise work very well on these networks. However if there was
demand for a 3G device RIM would look into it."