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At the 3GSM Conference in Barcelona, Spain, T-Mobile (News - Alert) International CEO Hamid Akhava reportedly expressed his belief that VoIP services on mobile phones will not be as successful as VoIP on computers.

Mobile VoIP services will require more complex implementation to address technical issues, Hamid was quoted as saying in published reports. Reachability is a problem, due to difficulty in passing on IP addresses of mobile users. There are also connectivity issues, since VoIP requires a considerable amount of bandwidth. Another key issue is the price of the service, since operation of mobile VoIP services requires buying a data package.

Skype (News - Alert) CEO Niklas Zennström, and director of business development for hardware and mobile, Eric Lagier, likewise agreed that there are technical issues in the provision of mobile VoIP services that need to be addressed. The issue of price was again raised, since there is a lack of flat-rate fees for mobile phone services, resulting in expensive rates for VoIP services deployed over mobile phones. This has led to delay in the release of Skype services.

Skype and Hutchison 3G announced their collaboration in last year’s 3GSM (News - Alert) World Congress, in the hopes of developing the first commercial VoIP service over mobile phones. Skype is one of the advocates of mobile VoIP services, while Hutchison 3G is a mobile phone operator offering IP-based mobile broadband networks in Europe.

T-Mobile International, a leading mobile communications company, is a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom (News - Alert). With over 100 million subscribers in 12 international markets, T-Mobile offers mobile multimedia services, including UMTS/3G, HSDPA and GPRS. The company also offers high-speed Internet access with its W-LAN technology.

T-Mobile provides both consumer and business solutions. It was the first to provide a trans-Atlantic mobile GSM-based network. The company is a partner of FreeMove, composed of Europe’s top four mobile companies, enabling efficient overseas communication. Through the global WorldClass tariffs, T-Mobile is able to provide its consumers with low-priced international access.

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Beverly Maniago is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To see more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.