The UK Telecommunications Equipment Manufacturers Association, TEMA, has expressed strong opposition to attempts at delaying Telepoint systems, based on the UK CT2 system, spreading into the rest of Europe. In a letter to the European Commission, TEMA rejects ESPA’s view that the spread of intermediate telepoint systems in Europe should be prevented. TEMA claims that ESPA’s view, based on the notion that such a spread would delay the introduction of what is now being called Digital European Cordless Telephony, DECT, is based on a narrow, partial and incorrect assessment of the market potential for both Telepoint and DECT. TEMA claims any restrictions would be an unwarranted restriction on demand and, in fact, be contrary to the Commission’s policies on the pan-European terminal equipment market. TEMA, which claims to be committed to an early introduction of the digital technology, says that cordless communication’s most important market will not necessarily come from businesses. The Commission does not wish to encourage the emergence of an interim European Telepoint standard based on the UK CT2 system, but it begins to look as if the battle is already lost and won: in its quest for foreign partners that might give it reciprocal leverage in their home markets, British Telecommunications Plc signed France Telecom to its Telepoint consortium at the beginning of the year, and is now likely to bring in the Deutsche Bundespost as well – and in each case, the European partner is talking in terms of introducing a Telepoint service in its home country based on the British CT2 standard. And with Philips NV the winner of another of the four Telepoint operators’ licences, and Nokia Oy of Finland involved through its shareholding in Shaye Communications Ltd, it seems likely that the CT2 technology will proliferate across Europe long before full agreement has been reached on standards for the follow-on digital cordless phone system.
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