In face of widespread enthusiasm about the development of 3G, Martin Cooper, inventor of the cell phone, reminded people to look at the rise of 3G with a sober mind at the ongoing 2005 Global Mobile Congress held in southwest China's Chongqing municipality.

Cooper, who created the world's first portable cellular phone on April 3, 1973, is now the CEO of ArrayComm, which creates smart antennas to increase the capacity of cellular networks.

"The application of 3G is a universal device. One device will be all things for all people. That's a wrong picture. It turns out that when you use a universal device, it doesn't do any one of these things very well," said Cooper.

Cooper believes that the potential of the next generation of wireless technology will depend on incorporating different devices and technologies.

"If you want an ideal camera, it will be a camera but not a cell phone. If you want an MP3 player, it will be an MP3 player but not a cell phone. The camera on the cell phone is not a very good camera. The MP3 player on the cell phone doesn't have good audio," Cooper explained.

Cooper held that, despite its numerous disadvantages, 3G's commercialization is inexorable due to the massive investment in it.

3G will face difficulty, "Because there will be many different new technologies coming out in the next decade. 3G will be only one of them. There will be fierce competition among them," said Mr. Cooper.

The 2005 Global Mobile Congress, which is to conclude on October 12, has attracted more than 130 mobile experts, operators and equipment suppliers such as Cooper, Arlene Harris, the "First Lady of Wireless", Peter Stavroulakis, chief architect of Athens 2004 Olympic Network, and Li Shihe, the father of China's homegrown third generation (3G) standard, and time-division synchronous code-division multiple access (TD-SCDMA).

The Global Mobile Congress, first held in Shanghai in 2004, will take place annually.

Source: Xinhua