Alan Hadden, President of GSA, has called for a further push to produce phones that build on the impressive growth of HD voice calls, Hadden said;

“Some operators reported 10 times the number of HD voice calls are currently being initiated compared to a year ago... To continue the market development, all smartphones need to ship with W-AMR activated by default.”

A media release from the GSA, to promote the GSA ‘Mobile HD Voice: Global Update’ report, supports the strong business case for Mobile HD Voice;

Customers make more, or longer, calls with HD Voice, and highly value the service. HD Voice helps operators to clearly differentiate their offerings and enable high quality services to voice dependent business like call center services, information services, emergency services, etc. HD Voice is also ideal for conference calls and can contribute to a reduction in business travel and raise productivity while reducing the environmental impact. Calls which are easier to hear and understand reduce the fatigue typically associated with long conference calls...

The GSA (Global mobile Suppliers Association) confirms 61 mobile networks have launched HD voice services in 45 countries.

HD voice services are now commercially launched on mobile networks in Armenia, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Czech Rep., Denmark, Dominican Rep., Egypt, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mauritius, Moldova, Netherlands, Nigeria, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Réunion, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, UAE, Uganda, UK, and the USA.

Mobile HD voice uses Adaptive Multi Rate Wideband (W-AMR) technology, enabling high-quality voice calls in supporting mobile networks and an improved user experience. It provides significantly higher voice quality for calls between mobile phones supporting the feature, and is market reality on many GSM, WCDMA-HSPA, and LTE networks.

Mobile HD Voice: Global Update, www.gsacom.com

Key 3GPP specifications on AMR and AMR-WB

See http://www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/html-info/26-series.htm

	3GPP TS	Title
	TS 26.071	AMR Speech Codec; General description
	TS 26.073	ANSI-C code for the Adaptive Multi Rate (AMR) speech codec
	TS 26.090	Mandatory Speech Codec speech processing functions; Adaptive Multi-Rate (AMR) speech codec; Transcoding functions
	TS 26.104	ANSI-C code for the floating-point Adaptive Multi Rate (AMR) speech codec
	TS  26.140	Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS); Media formats and codecs
	TS  26.141	IP Multimedia System (IMS) Messaging and Presence; Media formats and codecs
	TS 26.171	AMR Wideband Speech Codec; General Description
	TS 26.173	ANCI-C code for the Adaptive Multi Rate - Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec
	TS 26.174	AMR wideband speech codec; Test sequences
	TS 26.190	Speech Codec speech processing functions; AMR Wideband speech codec; Transcoding functions
	TS 26.191	Speech codec speech processing functions; Adaptive Multi-Rate - Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec; Error concealment of erroneous or lost frames
	TS 26.192	Speech codec speech processing functions; Adaptive Multi-Rate - Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec; Comfort noise aspects
	TS 26.193	Speech codec speech processing functions; Adaptive Multi-Rate - Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec; Source controlled rate operation
	TS 26.194	Adaptive Multi-Rate - Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec; Voice Activity Detector (VAD)
	TS 26.201	AMR wideband speech codec; Frame structure
	TS 26.202	Speech codec speech processing functions; Adaptive Multi-Rate - Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec; Interface to Iu, Uu and Nb
	TS 26.204	ANSI-C code for the Floating-point Adaptive Multi-Rate Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec
	TS 26.234	Transparent end-to-end Packet-switched Streaming Service (PSS); Protocols and codecs
	TS 26.273	ANSI-C code for the Fixed-point; Extended AMR Wideband codec
	TS 26.274	Audio codec processing functions; Extended Adaptive Multi-Rate - Wideband (AMR-WB+) speech codec; Conformance testing
	TS 26.290	Extended AMR Wideband codec; Transcoding functions
	TS 26.304	ANSI-C code for the Floating-point; Extended AMR Wideband codec
	TR 26.901	Adaptive Multi-Rate Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec; Feasibility study report
	TR 26.976	Performance characterization of the Adaptive Multi-Rate Wideband (AMR-WB) speech codec

Some 3GPP features for AMR and AMR-WB

	Feature	3GPP Work Item	Release	Working Group	Associated or affected Specifications
	AMR-WB extension for high audio quality	AMRWB+	6	S4	26.290, 26.304, 26.273, 26.274, 26.412, 26.936
	Floating-point ANSI-C code for the AMR-WB speech codec	AMRWB-FP	5	S4	26.204
	Mandatory speech codec for narrowband telephony service	Mandatory_Speech_Codec, AMR-NB, AMR	99	S4	04.08, 05.01, 05.02, 05.03, 05.05, 05.08, 05.09, 05.09, 05.50, 08.60, 08.61, 11.21, 26.071, 26.073, 26.074, 26.090, 26.091, 26.092, 26.093, 26.094, 26.101, 26.102, 26.103, 26.104, 26.975
	WBAMR / high quality speech in UMTS Phase 1 but not in R99	WBAMR	99	S1	22.105
	QoS for Speech and Multimedia Codec	QoS_for_Speech_&_MM_Codecs_/_AMR	99	S4	26.102, 26.912
	Tandem Free Operation - Adaptive Multi-Rate codec types	TFOAMR	99	S4	26.103
	Noise Suppression for AMR	AMRNS	99	S4	06.77, 06.78

Contact for this story:
Kevin FLYNN