The mobile TV technology, dubbed TDtv, utilizes UMTS TD-CDMA technology and the recently defined 3GPP Release 6 Multimedia Broadcast and Multicast Standard (MBMS). It joins other cellular and broadcast technologies such as DVB-H, MediaFLO and DMB.

IPWireless is targeting mobile operators already offering W-CDMA based 3G networks, and says TDtv offers them significant strategic, performance, and economic advantages over the competing mobile TV solutions since it allows such providers to utilize existing spectrum and infrastructure.

Several European and Asian operators have already committed to pilot TDtv based networks operating at 1900MHz or 2100MHz in the first half of 2006, as has Sprint Nextel, which is already trialing IPWireless’ TD-CDMA technology based broadband access equipment.

IPWireless maintains the deployment of TDtv would require a low capital expenditure by the operator as a single base station controller is required for 100 Node B's, while utilizing the operator's network eliminates the need to split revenues with broadcasters, who generally own the required spectrum.

TDtv enables the delivery of up to 50 channels of TV for standard screen size phones, or 15 higher quality QVGA channels via existing 5Mz of unpaired 3G spectrum available across Europe and Asia. In Japan, IPMobile plans to trial the technology for their services in their recently awarded 2010MHz spectrum. The mobile TV solution will also be made available to operators in the other frequency bands that IPWireless supports globally, including the 2.5GHz band. The company says operators that have 10MHz of spectrum in any of the bands supported, the solution can deliver twice the number of channels or increase the quality of their service offerings.

It also stresses that, unlike the alternatives, roll-out of mobile TV services globally based round DTtv is not hindered by, for instance, lack of licensed spectrum, the massive cost of building a new network and a potential loss of control of mobile TV services to broadcasters.

The IPWireless architecture is designed to integrate seamlessly with WCDMA on both the network and device side. At the cell site, the very low cost TDtv base stations can easily be co-sited on existing WCDMA sites without additional regulatory issues.

IPWireless is already developing , with un-named partners, the ASICs and software that will be integrated existing WCDMA handsets and devices. The initial two-chip TD-CDMA/WCMDA parts, already in prototype, will be able to reuse much of the WCDMA RF to lower cost and reduce size.

Chris Gilbert, chief executive officer of IPWireless, told EETimes “our core competency is increasingly development of the silicon, specifically the ASICs for the baseband part, as well as the necessary software.”

Ultimately, TDtv will be integrated into WCDMA chipsets. Because TD-CDMA can reuse many of the existing WCDMA stacks, Gilbert says this would add minimal cost to the device.

For its broadband wireless gear, TI is working with Texas Instruments on the W-CDMA aspects of the chip, but Gilbert said the company would likely name its chip partners for TDtv at next month’s 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, where it will also demonstrate the mobile TV technology. The latest investment from Sprint Nextel, which follows an earlier $4 million, brings the total raised by the company since its founding in 1999 to $200 million, mainly from venture capital groups.