Alcatel Shanghai Bell (ASB) and Datang Mobile concluded a strategic partnership agreement Thursday to jointly develop the TD-SCDMA (Time Division Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access) standard both in China and internationally.

According to the agreement, ASB will invest a total of 25 million euros (US$32.4 million) in Datang Mobile including shares and participation in the industrialization of TD-SCDMA, one of the three internationally acknowledged standards for the third generation (3G) of mobile communications.

"The partnership will become an active and effective driving force for the further development of TD-SCDMA," said Xi Guohua, vice-minister of the information industry, at yesterday's signing ceremony.

"We hope more and more enterprises both home and abroad to join in the team to develop the standard," he said.

According to the results of the latest experiments in China on the three 3G technologies, industry experts believed that though lagging behind the other two 3G standards, TD-SCDMA is able to realize its commercialization by June next year.

TD-SCDMA is the most advanced solution for mobile operators with unpaired frequency bands.

And the Chinese Government has allocated 155MHZ frequency resources to support the domestic standard.

"It is win-win deal for both of us," said Yuan Xin, chairman of the board of ASB, adding the two company is to form a dedicated team to focus on the industrialization of TD-SCDMA products.

"The partnership is a milestone for the development of the 3G technology in China," said Zhou Huan, chairman and president of Datang Telecom Group, the parent company of Datang Mobile.

(China Daily November 12, 2004)