In 1995, The Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC) commissioned a study under the title of ‘Study into [Prospects of] Cellular Mobile Telecommunications Market in Nigeria’. The report of that study led to various motion-without-movement experiences between then and year 2000 when there was a modification that turned out ‘a magic’.
In the early days of Mobile Systems, there was fragmented market. Systems went by their proprietary standards and generally cared less about interoperability. There were: The American Standards, The European Standards, and The Nordic Countries Standards. Two notable realizations emerged:
One; that mobile systems thrive on economy of scale and interoperability makes business sense and two; that even poor countries could be viable markets.
Then emerged ‘generational’ initiative as in assigning vocabulary to each stage of mobile technology development.
Each generation represented an improvement in spectrum capacity usage and ITU took advantage of the global realisation and situated itself better to play its natural role. It operated in a true belief that business would be truly global and that regulators would have less problems of incompatibility to deal with. The initiative seemed good for all concerned. On top of this, it was also realised that there is money to make everywhere.
The First Generation of systems for mobile telephony was analog, circuit switched, FDMA Access technology, and it only carried voice traffic. The analog phones used in 1G were less secure and prone to interference where the signal is weak. Analog systems include AMPS [in the US], NMT [ In Nordic Countries : East Europe, Asia and Russsia ] and ETACS [in UK].
The Second Generation of mobile telephony systems, 2G, uses digital encoding. 2G networks support high bit rate voice, limited data communications and different levels of encryption. 2G networks include GSM, D-AMPS (TDMA) and CDMA. 2G networks can support SMS applications.
General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) is a mobile data service available to users of GSM mobile phones. Although GSM is strictly a 2G standard, that GPRS is an enhancement of it makes it code-named a 2.5G generation of mobile phones. GPRS, which supports a wide range of bandwidths, is an efficient use of limited bandwidth and is particularly suited for sending and receiving small bursts of data, such as e-mail and Web browsing, as well as large volumes of data.
2.5G extends, an extension of if you like, 2G systems, adding features such as packet-switched connection and enhanced data rates. 2.5G networks include Enhanced Data Rates for Global Evolution EDGE and GPRS. These networks support WAP, MMS, SMS mobile games, search and directory.
One of the major limitations of Second Generation cellular communications systems is that data can only be transferred after a connection has been established. This is inefficient if only small amount of data is transferred, and in situations where data is transferred in bursts. 2.5G cellular systems allow a mobile station to be "always-online" for sending and receiving packet data. This allows efficient transfer of small amounts of data, without the overhead of establishing a connection for each transfer. It also efficiently supports bursty data transfers, avoiding the need to allocate capacity to a connection that cannot be reallocated by the network if the connection chooses not to use it. The two major forms of 2.5G enhancements to second-generation cellular systems are the General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) and Enhanced Data Rates for Global Evolution (EDGE).
The Next Generation Networks
The next generation networks (NGN) would support all traffic demands. Specifically, it should deliver all the following services:
A single network must converge voice, data and video traffic, support mobility, have a very high speed switching core, must be packet based technology and must support value added services.
It is usual to refer to 3G systems as a Next Generation Network System on account of the foregoing definition. They can also be described as ITU’s IMT 2000 family because it was in the year 2000 that there was unanimous approval of the technical specifications for third generation systems under the brand IMT-2000. The spectrum between 400 MHz and 3 GHz is technically suitable for the third generation. This approval meant that for the first time, full interoperability and inter-working of mobile systems could be achieved.
What specific advantages are envisaged?
IMT-2000 offers the capability of providing value-added services and applications on the basis of a single standard. The system envisages a platform for distributing converged fixed, mobile, voice, data, Internet and multimedia services. One of its key visions is to provide seamless global roaming, enabling users to move across borders while using the same number and handset. IMT-2000 also aims to provide seamless delivery of services, over a number of media (satellite, fixed, name it…). It is expected that IMT-2000 will provide higher transmission rates: a minimum speed of 2Mbit/s for stationary or walking users, and 348 kbit/s in a moving vehicle. (to be continued)
