Global Interoperability and Convergence

3G Americas advances interoperability by promoting evolution to Third Generation (3G) and beyond, through intensive interaction with national and international regulatory agencies, standards-development organizations, industry associations, and ad-hoc technology teams.

Additionally, 3G Americas fully supports the technical development activities by the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) for seamless interoperability between EDGE, UMTS/HSPA and LTE This interoperability will provide a global solution for seamless communication of 3G applications and service solutions.

Interoperability

A smooth evolution from second generation (2G) to third generation (3G) services is provided by a common core packet data network for GSM-based solutions. It also provides the foundation for interoperability between 2G and 3G GSM-based wireless systems.

The Third Generation Partnership (3GPP) project chartered the GSM EDGE Radio Access Network (GERAN) Technical Specifications Group to ensure interoperability between 2G and 3G systems on July 18-19, 2000. Release 5 of the 3GPP's specifications fully integrates EDGE with UMTS, since both use the same interface to the UMTS core network. Additionally, all EDGE terminals will be fully backward capable with GSM and support both GSM and GPRS. The integration of GSM, EDGE, and UMTS capabilities will create a single seamless 3G multi-radio system with a common core services network. Release 6 and 7 further defined the evolution and interoperability between the GSM family of technologies.

GERAN's contributing companies are strongly committed to its goal of developing "systems based on 3GPP specifications capable of rapid development and deployment of competitive service offerings while still enabling global roaming." 3G Americas fully supports the technical development of network interoperability based on this technological strategy and has many representatives from its Board of Governors companies developing, supporting, and deploying this initiative within the 3GPP technical work groups.

The result is seamless wireless voice and high-speed data services for current and future generation customers on a worldwide basis.