Recent Telecommunication Standardization Activities in China

3.1 Overview

Photo 1. CATR.

CATR (Photo 1) is located in the northwest part of Beijing. Its predecessor was the Posts and Telecommunications Academy, established in 1956 by the former MPT (Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications). The current CATR was established in 1994, as the result of a reorganization, from components such as the Research Institute of Transmission Technology (RITT), the Planning Institute, the Information Institute, the Communications Measurement Center, and the Industrial Standardization Institute. From the beginning, its mission has been to support the government and serve industry. Its organization is shown in Table 1.

Table 1. Organization of CATR.

Although it is only one of many MII institutes, its responsibilities are wide ranging and important for telecommunication standardization and it makes decisions for nationwide requirements. CATR has more than 12 laboratories, such as the Communication Standards Research Institute and the Planning and Design Research Institute. Its staff of about 800 includes over 200 with master's or higher degrees, more than 300 with senior technical professional titles, and over 40 who are experts receiving special government allowances. A photograph taken during our visit to CATR in November 2006 is shown in Photo 2. The general manager of the NTT Beijing Representative Office, Mr. Masaki, is standing in the center, with Ms. Liu (Director, Communications Standard Research Institute) on the left and Dr. Yan (Director, CATR) on the right.

Taken during our visit to CATR in Nov. 2006.
(Ms. Liu, Mr. Masaki, and Dr. Yan are in the center)

3.2 Missions of CATR

To better perform its function of supporting government work, CATR provides direct and professional research reports or timely information on science and technology and other data, gets deeply involved in discussions and investigations, and supports the government in its decision-making.

4.1 Overview

CCSA was established in Beijing on December 18, 2002 as a nonprofit organization in the area of telecommunications. Its members include telecommunication carriers, national experimental laboratories, universities, equipment/system vendors, and representatives from CATR. Its main missions are to establish and implement telecommunication standards and requirements in conjunction with telecommunication carriers, universities, national experimental laboratories, and vendors interested in standardization. It also provides several services, including an impartial certification service and an EMC testing service to customers. Another mission is to recommend high-level and high-quality standards to the Chinese government and spread standards based on Chinese intellectual property and to support Chinese industries and contribute to the telecommunication industries of the world.

Fig. 2. Organization of CCSA.

The organization of CCSA is shown in Fig. 2. There are nine technical committees (TCs). The main roles of CCSA are as follows.

(1) Make proposals for laws/regulations and political policies for the Chinese government with respect to standardization and pass on the opinions and requests of members to the administrative entities in charge and promote communication between the administration and CCSA members.

(2) Study telecommunication standards and technical research, propose new and revised telecommunication standards and draft original standards documents, collect opinions, perform coordination activities, examine documents, and perform certification and mutual connection testing.

(3) Advertise technical standards, provide consultation and training services, and promote the utilization of telecommunication standards.

More than 1000 technical standards have been established under the Technical Committees. Recently, many standards related to TD-SCDMA (time division synchronous code division multiple access), IPTV, IPsec (Internet protocol security), and G-PON (gigabit passive optical network) have been proposed and triple-play services,^* are being promoted aggressively in China.

4.2 Statistics about industrial standards

In China, many industrial standards are still in preparation [4]. These documents are managed by classification codes. The codes used for technical standards in the telecommunication area in China are listed in Table 2.

Table 2. Classification codes of technical standards for telecommunications.

The YD series are so-called industrial standards published by CATR after CCSA was established; these documents are managed by CCSA on behalf of CATR. The numbers of CCSA members and contributions to international standardization bodies such as ITU (International Telecommunication Union), IEC (International Electrotechnical commission), and 3GPP (3^rd Generation Partnership Project), are shown in Figs. 3 and 4. Both numbers have been rising steadily every year. In particular, the number of foreign companies that are members of CCSA has risen significantly. At present, NTT and NTT DoCoMo are participating in Working Groups TC3 on NGN and TC5 on B3G/wireless LAN (local area network) of the Wireless Communication Technical Committee, respectively. The number of contributions related to 3GPP and 3GPP2 in particular have increased with the coming of the third-generation mobile phone era, as shown in Fig. 4. Contributions related to 3GPP accounted for 80% of the total contributions to international bodies. The trend of the number of telecommunication industrial standards is shown in Fig. 5. About 200 standards are published per year. As an example, the YD series is shown in Table 3.

Fig. 3. Trend of CCSA members.

Fig. 4. Trend of contributions proposed to international standardization bodies.

Fig. 5. Trend of the number of telecommunication industrial standards in China (YD series).

Table 3. Example of telecommunication industrial standards in China (YD series).

Photo 3. Staff of NTT's Beijing Representative Office.

One indication of China's prominence on the international scene was the election of Houlin Zhao as Deputy Secretary-General of ITU at the end of 2006. The number of Chinese contributions to international bodies is still increasing, reflecting China's desire to reinforce standardization activities.

4.3 Next notable standardization areas in China

In a general meeting of CCSA held in December 2006, the president, Mr. Chu, reported the next notable standardization areas as being (i) NGN, (ii) IPTV, (iii) FMC (fixed-mobile convergence) including 3G, Beyond 3G, and wireless LANs, and (iv) IPR (intellectual property rights) management. He also indicated the following points as being important: reinforcement for international and national standardization activities, collaboration with global telecommunication industries because of a lack of patent technology, and promotion of contributions from foreign members.