July 30, 2006
3G cost billions: Will it ever live up to its hype?
An in depth articleon 3G by Kevin J. O'Brien for the IHT.
"European mobile phone companies spent $129 billion six years ago to buy licenses for "third-generation" networks that were supposed to give people the freedom to virtually live from their cellphones, reading e-mail, browsing the Internet, placing video calls, enjoying music and movies, buying products and services, making reservations, monitoring health - all from the beach, the bus, the dentist's waiting room, wherever they were.
But today, most people use their cellphones just as they did in 2000 - to make calls - and the modest gains 3G has made do not begin to justify the massive costs of the technology, which has strapped some mobile operators financially, bankrupted entrepreneurs, spurred multibillion-euro lawsuits against governments and phone companies, and sapped research spending.
Over the long term, 3G runs the risk of becoming the Edsel of the mobile phone industry - an expensive, unwanted albatross rejected by consumers and bypassed by other, less costly technologies, some experts say. ....
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