Chunghwa Telecom (CHT) on March 16 announced that it has formed a strategic alliance with US-based SiRF International to establish an A-GPS (assisted global positioning system) platform for operation of mobile location services in the Taiwan market.
CHT has finished R&D and testing of the A-GPS platform that integrates GPS technology with CHT’s mobile communication infrastructure, CHT indicated. CHT initially offered A-GPS services to Taiwan SECOM, the largest provider of security services in Taiwan, at the end of last year and plans to offer personal A-GPS value-added services to mobile communication users later this year, the company noted.
SiRF’s A-GPS technology has been adopted by many mobile communication services around the world, including NTT DoCoMo and KDDI in Japan, SK Telecom in South Korea, Orange in France and Vodaphone in UK, according to Tom Lin, SiRF’s vice president of sales for Asia-Pacific and general manager for the company’s Taiwan branch.
|
Comparison between GPS and A-GPS | ||
|
Item |
GPS |
A-GPS |
|
Positioning limitations |
GPS receivers should have direct view of satellites outdoors; unsatisfactory accuracy of positioning when receivers are under trees or among high-rise buildings; no signal can be received indoors |
Within the coverage of base stations, signals can be received even indoors or under obstruction by buildings, etc. |
|
Accuracy of positioning |
5-30 meters or more |
No more than 5-15 meters |
|
Time taken to lock (time to first fix, TTFF) |
30 seconds to 15 minutes for cold start only |
8 seconds without cold start |
|
Power consumption |
Relatively high |
Lower than GPS |
Source: CHT, compiled by DigiTimes, March 2006
Article translated by Adam Hwang and edited by Eric Mah
