Driving interoperability, ecosystem development, and future innovation.
Today, we take it for granted that our wireless devices and applications just work out of the box smartphones can connect, make calls, and receive and send data anywhere in the world; laptops can seamlessly connect to any Wi-Fi access point and Bluetooth peripheral; and the video recorded on one device can be played back perfectly on any other device. It’s not magic. It’s thanks to global technology standards that not only power a wide range of systems and devices but also bring many benefits to the broader technology ecosystem.
As the head of the standards group at Qualcomm Technologies, I have been involved with developing standardized technologies for about 30 years. Today, my team participates in about 200 global standards and industry organizations, which are responsible for standardizing a wide range of technologies adopted in electronic systems and devices. In this blog post, I will explain the importance of technology standards and highlight a few focus areas of ours, namely cellular, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and video coding.
The value of standards
Global technology standards play a critical role in the world of technology. For the wireless communications industry, they are the foundation of a transparent competitive ecosystem open for everyone and provide a continuous technology evolution roadmap. Standardization is a key step in bringing new interoperable technologies to the mass commercial market, creating significant value across the entire technology ecosystem. Let me explain why.Technology standards:
- Ensure system interoperability while enabling product differentiation.
- Create new markets and expand addressable markets of existing products and technology.
- Allow for better cost efficiency through economies of scale and multivendor sourcing.
- Reduce market risk, especially in areas that require large investments (e.g., cellular infrastructure, silicon chip designs).
- Improve reliability and become a vehicle to address regulatory requirements.
- Continue to enhance the technology by motivating participation, collaboration and competition from a diverse set of companies, creating the best solution possible.
But why would any company strive to be the leader in standards? Well, here at Qualcomm Technologies, we see three distinct advantages for standards leadership:
- First, it allows us to deliver better products while reducing time-to-market. For instance, communications standards are very complex in nature; thus, leadership in designing technology standards goes hand in hand with leadership in product development.
- Second, it gives us the opportunity to create and license valuable intellectual property (IP). When inventions are contributed to standards, they become accessible to everyone in the ecosystem. A solid IP framework can make sure that inventors are adequately incentivized to invest in R&D that generates valuable inventions.
- Third, it enables us to drive the technology forward with new functionalities and efficiencies, fostering healthy growth for the overall market that benefits the broader ecosystem.
Now that we’ve established that standards bring clear benefits for consumers, system vendors, and inventors, let me provide a quick overview to a few standards that are important to the wireless industry and highlight some of our key contributions.
