ATM: The Technology of Choice for Third Generation Wireless Networks

This paper explores the Third Generation Partnership project—Release 99 (3GPP) wireless networking standards from an infrastructure (both core and radio access), terminals and applications vantage point. It provides a chronological perspective of how we got from Second Generation (2G) wireless systems to the 3G standard known as Universal Mobile Telecommunications System / Wideband - Code Division Multiple Access (UMTS / W-CDMA) technology and why it relies so heavily on Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) and its low latency, high QoS capabilities for wireless and video delivery.