CDG concludes OMH trials in emerging markets

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The CDMA Development Group (CDG) has concluded its latest Open Market Handsets (OMH) trials in cooperation with CDMA operators in Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Thailand.

Operators who participated in the trails include CityCell in Bangladesh, PT. Telekomunikasi Indonesia and PT. Indosat in Indonesia, and HutchCAT in Thailand, with OMH-enabled Removable User Identity Module (R-UIM) cards provided by Eastcompeace, Gemalto, KSI, Oberthur or Watchdata and prototype devices developed by Huawei or ZTE.

During the trials, OMH were provisioned for full-fledged 3G data capabilities across the participating operators. Tested, proven features included backward compatibility, CDMA2000 1X packet data (SIP with CHAP and PAP), BREW, SMS, voice (with authentication), WAP/browser capabilities and R-UIM-based carrier customization.

CDG chief operating officer James Pearson said the completed trials in Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Thailand complement previously-announced trials with Reliance Communications and TATA Indicom in India as well as with Bakrie Telecom and Mobile-8 Telecom in Indonesia.

He said major handset providers including Nokia, LG and Samsung are also working on implementing R-UIM-enabled CDMA handsets, with plans to launch commercial products early next year in these countries.

OMH enables both operator-specific configuration information and subscriber-specific provisioning information to be moved from the handset's non-volatile (NV) memory into a next-generation R-UIM or smartcard.

By doing so, the handset becomes a generic device that can be sold on the 'open market' and used in multiple operator networks. This will provide greater economy of scale for data devices on CDMA networks and give CDMA operators more variety of handsets, Pearson said.

The OMH program is part of the CDG's overall Global Handset Requirements for CDMA (GHRC) initiative, which specifies a common set of requirements and standards for approving CDMA devices in an open-device and open-application environment.