GSM: Evolution Towards 3rd Generation Systems

Ongoing efforts in GSM standardization are focused on in 'Phase 2+' with gradual additions for a fast and modular evolution. Speech remains the prime service of cellular systems, with ongoing work on spectral efficiency taking into account the tradeoff between cost of the system and transmission quality. Most of the notable results from novel speech service implementations are addressed herein such as new EFR speech codec and Advanced Speech Cell Items (ASCI). Data capability in 'Phase 2+' has been covered under General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) and High-Speed Circuit Switched Data (HCSD) work items. Initiatives under CAMEL cover intelligent networking (IN) within the GSM framework.