NTT DoCoMo, HP Link Up On 4G Wireless Research

date: 19th December 2000, source: Yahoo

NTT DoCoMo has outlined plans to work with Hewlett-Packard on the development of multimedia and network applications for use with fourth generation (4G) wireless networks.

Both companies have already been working together on a number of third generation (3G) wireless technologies, but the plan now is to enable a variety of interactive e-commerce services for people on the move.

Even though 3G handsets and their networks are not expected to arrive in volume much before the fourth quarter of 2001, many experts now see the technology as cast in stone, forcing them to look ahead to 4G wireless networks for multimedia content and feature ID applications.

Features already being discussed for 4G networks include precise location technologies several stages more accurate than 3G mobiles with their GPS (global positioning system) location technologies, with an accuracy of just a few meters. This could make privacy a big issue with the 4G mobiles, when they arrive.

For DoCoMo, how 3G and 4G networks develop is of major interest, as the carrier says it now has more than 15 million mobile Internet (iMode) phones already hooked up.

HP's linkup with NTT DoCoMo follows hard on the heels of a similar linkup with Nokia to develop mobile security technologies.

That linkup, announced on Dec. 12, saw the US printer and PC vendor snuggle up to the Finnish telecommunications company for its Nokia Activ technology.

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