NTT DOCOMO Inc., Renesas Technology Corp., Fujitsu Ltd. and Sharp Corp. have announced a plan to jointly develop the SH-Mobile G4 single-chip LSI device, and a platform incorporating it, to support the HS PA1/HSDPA2/W-CDMA and GSM/GPRS/EDGE (2G) mobile telephony standards. Development of the platform is targeted for completion by the fourth quarter of fiscal 2009 (January-March 2010).
The new SH-Mobile G4 will be fabricated with 45 nm process technology to enable highly integrated functions and extra-fast processing. It will provide enhanced functionality and improved performance. In addition to HSDPA cat.8 for extra-fast downlink speeds (maximum 7.2 Mbps), the SH-Mobile G4 will support HSUPA to boost uplink speeds to a maximum of 5.7 Mbps, almost 15 times faster than the conventional 384 kbps speeds.
In 2004 NTT DOCOMO and Renesas began joint development work on the SH-Mobile G series of single-chip LSI devices, which integrate a baseband processor that supports dual-mode communication and an application processor. The SH-Mobile G4 will be the fourth product to emerge from this collaboration.
This joint development work has since progressed to now include handset manufacturers such as Fujitsu and Sharp. Each platform has a SH-Mobile G series product as the core component and includes a basic software suite (OS, middleware and drivers) and a reference chipset in a single package. By using the new platforms, mobile phone manufacturers can eliminate the need to develop basic functions independently, significantly reducing development time and costs. Renesas plans to provide the platform to the worldwide mobile phone market, in addition to customers in Japan.