Outside the 2005 Broadband World Forum Asia the sculptural artwork was a potent symbol of the contest to come.

Visitors to Yokohama’s vast Pacifico conference and exhibition campus could hardly fail to notice the shiny stainless steel construction that sits astride the main pedestrian entry route.  With a back-drop of one of Yokohama’s many communications towers this engineering puzzle seemed entirely appropriate outside of a conference where the delegates may well have been dazed by the twists and turns of the telecoms industry.

This edition of the World Forum - like Supercom in Chicago just a week later - had something for everyone.  Maybe the broadband world should be studied by anthropologists for its richness of curious cultures and tribal tendencies. But while the next-generational, all-IP brigade were triple-playing to their hearts content, the biggest stir by far came from the wireless wizards.

The words mobile and broadband have never really sat easily together - unless of course mobility is reduced to a nomadic standstill and broadband is detuned and redefined as a bit like fast dial-up.  And the notions of all-IP and Mobile are also less than universally united despite the protestations of those suppliers who think they may have found a get-well plan for whatever ‘last generation’ technology they are locked into.

Japan has something of an edge in developing mobile broadband markets.  They’ve had PHS for years so customers, service providers and handset designers have had time to think through what you can use the extra capacity for.  This well-informed market platform is the foundation for building new services - and the mobile technology choices fall into two camps.

In the Blue corner are technologies rooted in Voice - hence the support for forms of Super3G.  They argue not for massive bandwidth (you can get that wired or fibred) but for the convenience of hand-held kit and ‘fitness for purpose’ data capacity.  Over in the Red corner are the Data guys who are busy adding wide-area mobility (and Voice) to technologies that were originally designed for a bit of wireless flexibility in the office.

To get into a worthwhile business both camps will need spectrum.  The Japanese regulator is working to a timetable that leads not to an auction but a ‘beauty contest’ in Q4 this year for several frequency bands.  The chances are that both camps could win spectrum but for business models targeted at different market segments.  To succeed they’ll both need to have technologies that are highly spectrum efficient to make best use of the limited bands.

One of the contenders is bound to be eAccess - a five-year old DSL provider with an amazing record of profitability and service performance.  The great strength of eAccess lies in its management and ‘serial entrepreneur’ Sachio Semmoto’s rich experience from founding both DDI (now KDDI) and Pocket (now WLLCOM).  Intriguingly Sachio Semmoto would not be drawn on his technology choice but, pointing to his recent DSL success, chose to claim that the real differentiator was entirely in the business management expertise.  The smart money would bet on eAccess choosing to be in Blue corner but stretching 3G concepts way beyond their current performance and positioning for mass consumer markets with rich content.

In the Red corner there are a few wireless choices rooted in data technologies but none so well adapted to mobility as local manufacturer Kyocera - the primary producer of PHS base stations and their ‘adaptive antenna’.  Their contribution to the looming broadband battle was to launch last week a major demonstration network covering a swathe of Yokohama with the iBurst technology. Its difficult to read the positioning but it looks as if they might choose to partner for services directed at business markets - more inclined towards lap-top and PC users with voice added to their standard IP capabilities.

What seems clear, however, is that the decision timing, the market, the built environment and the spectrum availability does not suit WiMAX.  The mobility decisions are running ahead of the emergence of 802.16e and the fixed DSL market is already delivering capacity and price performances that are way beyond US and European experience.  With the rapid growth of fixed DSL capabilities around the world it is even beginning to look as if 802.16d is, for many markets, a solution to coverage and capacity problems that are fast disappearing.

With its twists and turns, the sculpture outside of the Broadband World Forum in Yokohama stands as a potent symbol of the contest to come over the next 12 months. Hang on - it’s going to be a roller-coaster ride.

The author, David Brunnen, is founder of Groupe Intellex, a collaborative consultancy specialising in business development of 'disruptive technologies’.