Back carriers for 4 G LTE TDD through the new initiative

Mobile operators including China Mobile, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone have launched a new initiative to promote the network technology (fourth generation) 4 G LTE TDD as a global standard.

TDD LTE (Long Term Evolution Time Division duplexing), also known as TD-LTE in China, is one of two variants of LTE, which both offer higher data speeds than to networks 3 G (third generation) today. With TDD, operators can optimize their network to allow more ability to download more for arrivals, for example. The other variant, FDD (frequency division duplexing), networks usually must allocate the same bandwidth for downloads for uploads.

Supporters of TDD kicked out of their own this week at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. Other funders include Japanese Softbank Mobile, Clearwire and the Germany E-Plus.

China Mobile, the largest mobile carrier in the country to 584 million customers, was the main supporter of TD-LTE. At the same time, China's Government has already started the large-scale testing of technologies and is researching the development of commercial equipment to the networks of TD-LTE.

But TDD LTE interest grew among other mobile operators elsewhere, analysts and vendors of network equipment. Wednesday, China's ZTE said assured 18 contracts to build LTE TDD networks and commercial trial in Europe, former Soviet republics and Asia.

The initiative has just announced it intended to develop the "ecosystem" for LTE TDD and promote it. This could lead to faster development of low cost LTE TDD phones, as well as the promotion of a community of developers to build applications and content for these devices, they say its promoters.

The initiative runs counter to the way China Mobile deployed its 3 G network, said CW Cheung, Director, research firm Ovum consulting. China Mobile uses a standard 3 G called TD-SCDMA (Time Division Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access), which is a homegrown technology supported by the Government of China. The standard TD-SCDMA is used only in China and was developed as a way to reduce dependence on foreign technology.

But his promotion was a challenge for China Mobile, because the technology is not used at world level. Many of the most popular smartphones like the iPhone cannot be used on a TD-SCDMA network and instead should have been redesigned to work on it.

This new initiative, however, is "an important milestone," passing by the Chinese Government and China Mobile distribution technology LTE TDD, Cheung said: "They're now not only focusing on technologies and standards, but more about ecosystem development, partnership, public relationship."

The initiative also aims to promote convergence of LTE TDD with LTE FDD. Carriers have expressed interest in using both standards on their 4 G networks as a way to maximize their capabilities.