TI teams with Japanese for new 3G cellphone technology

Stuart Corner
Friday, 28 July 2006 02:29

IT Industry - Strategy

In a move aimed at countering the dominance of Nokia and Motorola Texas Instruments, NEC, Matsushita and Panasonic Mobile will invest 12 billion yen ($US 104m) in a new joint venture to develop a hardware and software platform for 3G/3.5G mobile handsets and beyond.
Separately NEC and Panasonic Mobile have announced plans to form a JV to develop complete 3G/3.5G handsets.

Nokia and Motorola between them control over 50 percent of the handset market, and with Motorola now challenging Nokia  for the number one spot, life will only get tougher for competitors. At the same time massive R&D will be required to develop future generation handsets, and those companies with the largest sales volumes across which to amortise this R&D will be at a considerable advantage.

Mobile handsets based on the new communications platform to be developed by the joint venture company are expected to become available in the northern autumn of 2007.

Specifically, five companies will be involved in the JV: NEC Corporation, NEC Electronics Corporation, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co Ltd, Panasonic Mobile Communications Co and Texas Instruments.

The joint venture, Adcore-Tech Co Ltd, will "conduct global development, design, and technology licensing for a hardware and software communications platform to manage the core communications functions for mobile handsets for the third generation (3G/3.5G) and beyond."

It will be set up in August at the Yokosuka Research Park in Yokosuka, Japan with approximately 180 employees and the five companies between them will invest 12.0 billion yen ($US104m) in the new joint venture, with approximately 44 percent held jointly by NEC and NEC Electronics, approximately 44 percent held jointly by Matsushita and Panasonic Mobile, and approximately 12 percent held by Texas Instruments.

NEC and Panasonic Mobile will contribute their expertise in developing 3G/3.5G (W-CDMA/HSDPA) handsets. Matsushita, NEC Electronics and Texas Instruments will bring chip development expertise.

All five companies will license communications technology to the new company for 2.5G/3G/3.5G. It in turn will licence its chip technology to NEC Electronics, Matsushita's Semiconductor Company and Texas Instruments. These companies will then manufacture chips to be incorporated into NEC and Panasonic Mobile handsets. NEC Electronics, Matsushita's Semiconductor Company and Texas Instruments will also sell these chips to mobile handset manufacturers worldwide.

The new company will license "comprehensive solutions, including communications platform and necessary software, system evaluation, and customising services" to mobile handset manufacturers.