Handset range takes speedy route to market

China's leading mobile phone manufacturer TCL Mobile Communication has launched a new range of mobile phones in China using TTPCom's technology.

China's leading mobile phone manufacturer TCL Mobile Communication has launched a new range of mobile phones in China using TTPCom's technology.

The phones are the result of a collaboration announced in January of this year between the two companies and include a top of the range camera phone and entry-level products for the China market and beyond.

The TCL 818 camera phone is a flagship product featuring integrated digital camera, two colour LCDs, Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) and polyphonic sound.

All of the new phones, including the entry level models i919, i929, i939 and middle level L718, feature exciting wireless games using TTPCom's wireless graphics engine (WGE) and incorporate GPRS class 10 technology which will enable users to make good use of available GPRS networks for the exchange of photos and other media.

TCL has used TTPCom's Dzign tool to facilitate the easy branding and customisation of the phones' man machine interface (MMI).

TCL has stated its ambition to become number 5 in the world mobile phone market within the next 3 years and last year the company increased its manufacturing capacity to 12 million phones.

To enable TCL to make a step change in the number of mobile phones under development, TTPCom and TCL signed a long-term strategic agreement in January 2003.

Under the terms of the agreement TTPCom and TCL created a joint development lab to facilitate the transfer of wireless expertise and know how between the two companies, to bring the latest functionality to market in as short a time as possible and to enable TCL to develop a roadmap of innovative products suitable for the worldwide mobile phone market.

The lab has been incredibly successful and during 2003 TCL has supplied over 4 million phones into the Chinese market based on TTPCom's protocol software and chipset designs.

Dr Wang Ji Yang, Deputy CTO of TCL stated: "Working with TTPCom has enabled us to take more control of the products that we are developing and to create customised designs that we know are attractive to the Chinese market.

We are very pleased with the speed at which we have been able to develop a wide selection of new entry level and top of the range camera phones.

TTPCom's platform approach, that enables technology to be reused across a range of phones, is key to keeping pace with a fast changing market and with TTPCom's assistance we have consolidated our position as the leading manufacturer in China.

Our next objective is to take these products to Europe".

He added, "as a long-term strategic partner, TTPCom have provided a very clear roadmap for future technologies, and development of a new Smartphone for the Chinese market is already at an advanced stage".

"Since establishing the TCL lab we have worked very closely with TCL to expand their product range.

Their engineers are very experienced in mobile phone developments and we have every confidence that TCL phones will start to emerge in Europe within the next 12 months", commented Dr Miles Upton, Commercial Director at TTPCom Singapore.

"TTPCom's technology has been designed with flexibility in mind, allowing customers to easily develop a variety of differentiated products from the same core platform.

In addition, with our long-standing experience in GSM/GPRS phone technology we are able to anticipate the issues that might delay production and can speed products through the approvals process.

This approach has delivered real time to market benefits for TCL as demonstrated by the strong sales of handsets using our technology during 2003".

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