Poland's third generation is born
A year ago, Polkomtel became the first mobile phone operator to provide commercial 3G (third generation) services. After providing coverage for Warsaw at the end of 2004, the company finally moved to other Polish cities, and in September it launched UMTS technology (necessary for providing 3G services) in the Tri-City, Kraków, Katowice, Poznań and Wrocław.
Polska Telefonia Cyfrowa (PTC) - the operator of Era and Heyah - is also eyeing 3G expansion, and has recently signed a framework agreement with Siemens and Ericsson to build a UMTS network. Ultimately, PTC wants to launch UMTS services in ten Polish cities.
A member of PTC's board, Janusz Kaliszek, says that by the end of March 2006 PTC wants to provide 3G services in Łódź, Wrocław, Katowice, Kraków, Poznań, Lublin, Tri-City, Szczecin, Toruń and Bydgoszcz, in addition to its existing Warsaw service. This will allow PTC's UMTS services to reach 20 percent of Poland's citizens (a requirement which must be fulfilled for companies to be granted UMTS licenses in Poland).
Poland's third telecommunications provider is not far behind. "Orange will launch commercial 3G services based on UMTS technology by the end of 2005," Centertel's spokesperson Jacek Kalinowski said. However, he didn't disclose which cities will be covered by the new technology. "We will announce this when we launch Orange's 3G network," he said. Kalinowski was also enigmatic about the cost of the infrastructure, which he claimed "at this stage will amount to several hundred euro."
The new player
Netia joined the three established operators as the fourth provider when it won the tender for UMTS frequencies back in May. "Netia Mobile plans to invest around EUR 650 (zł.2,527) million in infrastructure and reach approximately 20 percent of market share within the next 10 years," Netia's spokesperson Jolanta Ciesielska said. Netia, which owns 30 percent of shares in Netia Mobile, will invest no more than EUR 90 (zł.350) million.
"We are currently in the phase of choosing infrastructure suppliers, we are talking with a few companies, and before the end of the year we should have signed the necessary agreement and started building," Netia's president Wojciech Mądalski said. He added that since around 12 months are needed to cover 16-17 percent of the country, "there are high chances that 3G services will be launched at the end of the next year."
The future of telecom
Although UMTS does make it possible to provide impressive 3G services such as high speed wireless internet, (up to 2 Mbps) multimedia services (music videos, sports highlights or mp3s), videoconferences and virtual meetings with TV-like quality, experts are still unsure whether GSM technology won't be made obsolete soon. "I do not expect 3G mobile phone services to become a mass product in the near future," Deutsche Bank CEE telecom analyst Krzysztof Kaczmarczyk said.
"UMTS gives fantastic technological services that people love, but are not willing to pay for. All these novelties are nice, but it is still a phone," he adds.
Kaczmarczyk doesn't expect the boom for 3G services to start for two or three years. He underlines that although it offers great possibilities for business people, it is the multimedia aspect of 3G phones, like games, videos and music, that is the most exciting, and therefore private users are likely to be the main target.
