Today's Mobile Phone To Become A Thing Of The Past
The Age
Tuesday July 14, 1992
Technology is about to catch up with Australia's 400,000-plus mobile-phone users, and it could be very expensive.
The present analogue mobile phone system is due to be phased out by the year 2000 as a new, more advanced, digital system begins to be phased in from early next year by Telecom's MobileNet, Optus Communications and a yet-to-be-decided third mobile carrier.
Telecom's digital mobile system was demonstrated for the first time in Australia yesterday at a conference on mobile communications in Sydney.
This digital system will offer better voice reproduction and call security, be able to carry paging messages and allow phones to lock into fax machines and personal computers without the need for a modem. Subscribers, using an identity module card, will also be able to plug into any digital mobile phone and have their call charges billed to their home accounts.
However, this system cannot be operated through existing mobile handsets. The present car, transportable and hand-held mobile phone models that now cost more than $2000 each will be redundant in eight years and existing mobile users will have to buy new handsets to plug into the digital system.
These new handsets will be more expensive than current analogue models (at least to begin with). MobileNet estimates digital handsets will sell for about $1000 more than current models, with prices likely to come down by 1995. For a top-of-the-line Telecom hand-held digital mobile phone, you might expect to pay $2800 to $3000. Optus expects handsets to be 30 to 40 per cent dearer.
Not only will the hardware be more expensive, initial call charges are expected to be more expensive as well, at least until the digital system attracts enough subscribers to force competing carriers to lower their prices.
Telecom, Optus and mobile phone retailers are looking at trade-in deals for people wanting to swap from one system to the other but they have no firm plans yet.
How beneficial such deals will be for new subscribers, with more than 1000 new mobile customers a month as the digital system expands, remains to be seen.
These subscribers face the dilemma of whether to buy analogue handsets and subscribe to the current mobile system, or invest in digital handsets and subscribe to the digital system, which, although it will be up and running early next year, will not have as wide a coverage area as the current mobile system until about 1997.
The telecommunications regulatory authority, Austel, is examining the problems faced by this group. A spokesman said Austel was hoping to hold talks with Telecom and Optus to ensure that new and existing mobile customers could make informed choices about the costs, benefits and most appropriate time to switch to the digital system.
The acting president of the Cellular Dealers Association of Australia, Mr Gary Gould, said he did not expect mobile users would lose money in changing systems. Most users, particularly business, tended to replace their mobile phones every four to five years already.
© 1992 The Age
