[time-nuts] Giove A has become "official" now.

Magnus Danielson cfmd at bredband.net
Mon Jan 15 10:47:00 EST 2007


From: bg at lysator.liu.se
Subject: Re: [time-nuts] Giove A has become "official" now.
Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2007 16:19:55 +0100 (CET)
Message-ID: <1301.210.4.139.138.1168874395.squirrel at webmail.lysator.liu.se>

Björn,

> On Mon, January 15, 2007 15:59, Magnus Danielson said:
> 
> >> >I have heard that the proposed fee was 1 EUR, but I don't know the
> >> current
> >> >idea about it.
> >>
> >> The 1EUR per receiver fee is not decided and if it was, it would be
> >> pointless, because there is no way to enforce and it would never
> >> amount to enough money to matter anyway.
> >
> > I agree it would be rather pointless, but at least for some manufactures
> > it
> > would/could be a limiting factor and unnecessary hazzle.
> 
> Does not every Firewire chip deliver some royalty to Apple? Is Bluetooth
> free of royalty?

You are missing the point. If they have GPS for free (license free, patents may
or may not apply) then will another license given enought extra benefit for the
general user? I am not sure the answer is a firm yes. If I speculate that it is
a no, and then only some users is willing to pay for the additional benefit
(assuming there is one) then the penetration will be much less than they hoped
for. For Firewire it is easy, eather you have it or you don't. For GNSS it is
GNSS (license free) and GNSS (license free and license covered).

If the license is too high, there will be a differentiation on the chips, GPS
and GPS + Galileo. A small metal mask difference enables/disables the Galileo
functionality. The GNSS receiver manufactuers will drop the right ship on the
PCB depending on which model they would make. The market would decide if
Galileo licensing strategy will fly or not.

If the license is sufficiently low, or none, there will not be any
differentiation and it will just be included. Differentiation may still be
available for the manufacters as software option thought.

> But again, the open service will most probably be for free.

Let's hope so. So far, I can't assume so, I did read the initial text for the
PRN codes with particular interest.

They need to be clear about level of licensing fee, if any, in good time
prior to the first real chips to be designed and pumped out.

Cheers,
Magnus



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