Scenario 3rd. Wireless Broadband not yet touched
In 2006.
Although MIC(Ministry of Information & Communication)'s Strong Will and Support the legislation about IpTV and the other Telecommunication & Broadcasting convergence services, the response to MIC's IT 839 Stretegy is very negative. KT and SKTelecom invest very conservatively on the Wibro network deployment from 2006 to 2007. There is no service coverage advantage, price and terminal for this new service. KTF and SKTelecom have invested largely on WCDMA network deployment, too. But the killer application of WCDMA is video chat. The needs and coverage, price and terminal are not attractive for customer, neither. In 2006, Wibro service subscriber is under 1K and WCDMA 10K.
In 2007.
The weightness of mobile and data services is moving from mobility and price to the contents. The regularion of IpTV has passed and almost potal jump into the contents delivery services. In this service, the data throughput is most important. The data throughput of Wibro is not enough to enjoy the contents delivery service and the price is not fit to this needs. The main issues of telecommunication is to extend the national back-bone network. The subscriber of WCDMA is over 300K but the switching over from CDMA to WCDMA is not fast. The Wibro service user is about 10K.
In 2008.
There is no strong driving forces. WiMAX is not welcommed in spite of the interoperability between WiMAX and WiFi. Customers prefer the FTTH and metro LAN instead of Wireless Broadband; Wibro and WCDMA. Customer want the mobility but individual and small WiFi network is the best solution because of the lower price. The main business stream is moving from supplying mobility to delivering contents. The WCDMA service is believed as same one with CDMA. WCDMA and Wibro fails to get its own position in the market. WCDMA user is under 1M. and Wibro is 20K.
In 2009 ~ 2010
Korea is the contury with powerful netowrk infrastructure but it's not based on Wibro. 4G specification is getting more concern because of the 3.5G (Wibro & HSDPA) failure.
Neither WCDMA nor WiBRO becomes mainstream in wireless broadband communication because the concept of "always on" through wireless communication is still future except WI-FI. A demand for ubiquitous connectivity for the dream of "always on" constantly grows but the market puts more value on higher speed than "supporting mobile situation." As a result more "wired" or "WI-FI" based high-speed internet access becomes ubiquitous rather than WCDMA or WiBRO.