X-bit labs

Intel and Nokia Scrap Plans for 3G Module for Notebooks.

Category: Mobile

by Anton Shilov

[ 02/16/2007 | 10:04 AM ]

The world’s top supplier of x86 microprocessors for notebooks, Intel, and the leading producer of mobile phones, Nokia, said that they had decided to scrap the plans to jointly develop HSDPA (High-Speed Downlink Packet Access) module for laptops, which would allow end-users to use high-speed mobile Internet without need to acquire additional hardware.

“We have, together with Intel, canceled the HSDPA module cooperation in the form we formerly announced. We are still looking at the HSDPA module case from a technological point of view, but no decisions have been made on commercializing it,” Eija-Riitta Huovinen, a spokeswoman for Nokia, is quoted as saying by Reuters news-agency.

In mid-2006 it transpired that Intel was working on the code-named Windigo technology that allows to substitute expensive proprietary cellular network cards. The Windigo was claimed to be a set of chips as well as radio antenna that provide notebooks opportunity to connect to 2.5G (EDGE, Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution) and 3G (CDMA-2000/WCDMA) networks without using specially designed cards, such as Vodafone Mobile Connect. End-users would have to plug-in their SIM cards into computers to connect.

In late-September, 2006, Dadi Perlmutter, general manager in Intel’s mobility group, said at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco that Nokia’s HSDPA technology would be a part of the code-named Santa Rosa mobile platform. However, at this point the companies decided not to proceed with the feature due to “inadequacy” in terms of business.

“We both saw that there was not an adequate business case," she said, referring to the potential return on investment,” Ms. Huovinen said.

Intel and Nokia are also working on the mobile WiMAX development and deployment, a technology that basically competes against 3G.