By Wang Jianxin and Zhang Yongxing     

    SINGAPORE, April 28 (Xinhuanet) -- Full-page advertisements of the third generation (3G) mobile phones and services have been seen almost everyday in local newspapers for the past few months, inviting Singaporeans to have a taste of the brand-new technology.

    Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel), MobileOne (M1) and Starhub, the three major telecommunications operators in the island state, got into fierce competition in the third generation mobile phone (3G) services since last December.

    SingTel, the country's biggest player in the telecoms market, was the first to both complete a 3G mobile network covering the whole island in last November and launch a trial of its services with selected participants.

    The three-month free trial ending in mid-December last year provided the company with feedback that among all the content and applications available, video calls were users' favorite as long as the price was reasonable.

    On Jan. 4 this year, the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA), the country's telecoms regulator, announced that all the three companies had surpassed its criterion of at least 95 percent street level coverage to reach 98 percent, which gave green light to commercial service launch.

    Though the last among the three operators to start a trial, M1 took the lead on commercially rolling out its 3G mobile phone services on Feb. 17 this year at the price of 0.40 Singapore dollar (about 0.24 US dollar) per minute for video calls.

    This triggered off a price war between M1 and SingTel, which started offering commercial 3G services a week later than its rival.

    SingTel 3G services subscribers only have to pay 0.20 Singapore dollar (about 0.12 US dollar) a minute during peak hours and 0.10 Singapore dollar (about 0.06 US dollar) in the off-peak period fortheir local video calls, which is the same rate as its local voicecall.

    M1, in its turn, lowered its video call price to 0.15 Singapore dollar (about 0.09 US dollar) per minute, and more surprisingly, video calls between M1 users are free for the first five minutes.

    Starhub, being the last to unveil its 3G price plans just one day ago, sets it at 0.15 Singapore dollar (about 0.09 US dollar) per minute, while offering users 100 minutes of free outgoing video calls every month.

    To attract more people to using the high speed mobile data service, most content offered by the three telecoms operators are free for a limited period of time, but the companies are reluctantto reveal what the price will be when the period is over.

    Operating at a speed up to 384 Kilobytes per second (Kbps), almost nine times faster than that of the 2.5G General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) network, the 3G network enables users to enjoy a bundle of new and exciting services.

    Users can surf the Internet, send data, stream and download real-time video clips such as sports replays, news headlines, music videos and movie trailers, or even watch movies smoothly.

    Local media reported days ago that the first drama to be viewedon 3G mobile phones will be available in mid-June in Singapore, comprising 30 episodes with each lasting three minutes.

    Also the first of its kind in Asia, the Chinese language drama will be released on mobiles before reaching any other media and video market.

    Users may also expect services including virtual meetings and peer-to-peer messaging by means of email, Instant Messaging (IM) or Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS), to come in the near future.

    The most exciting thing is that users can get all these done while they are on the move, overcoming the time and space barriersbetween individuals and the Internet.

    Though it sounds magnificent, some people still believe that the 3G has not found its "killing application" yet, as quoted by Today, a local newspaper.

    The lack of handset choices represents another but easier challenge to deal with.

    Currently, a handful of 3G phone modules are available in localmarket at a price of around 1,000 Singapore dollars (about 600 US dollars) each, including Motorola V975 and E1000, Sony Ericsson Z1010, LG U8100, Nokia 6680 and Samsung SGH-Z107.

    But more 3G phones are in the pipeline as Sony Ericsson Z800i and K600i will be on the shelves soon and Nokia will launch 10 newmodels this year.

    Though SingTel announced in late February that it had only some2,000 3G customers, the International Data Corp (IDC) predicted recently that Singapore will be among the top five countries with the highest penetration of 3G users.

    The research firm expected 744,800 Singaporeans to use 3G mobiles by 2009, accounting for around 20 percent of the country'spopulation.

    "Network performance, pricing and service positioning will become areas of focus to move 3G from niche to mainstream," Today quoted Alayne Wong, communications research manager with IDC Asia-Pacific, as saying. Enditem