Every year after the show, I wonder if I should write a column with profound insight into the state of the wireless telecommunications industry and enamor you with all of the wisdom I have gleaned from the show, or should I take the easy way out and just share gossipy tidbits of information heard from people at the show.
And each year, lacking in profound wisdom and overflowing with gossipy tidbits, I choose the easy way out.
So with that understanding, here are some gossipy tidbits from CTIA’s Wireless 2001 show in Las Vegas:
“Where’s the voice? This show has turned into one big wireless data show.”
“Where’s the data? Now that the Wireless Data Forum has been mixed into CTIA, no one is going to pay attention to the content providers any more.”
“Thank God we got our funding last year.”
“Lucent won a $5 billion contract from Verizon? I wonder how much that cost them …”
“Verizon and Sprint PCS are really snipping at each other. They are getting really nasty, competitively. And of course, they both hate AT&T.”
“Nextel joined the CDMA Development Group about a month ago.”
“When carriers came to manufacturers after they won big at foreign auctions, the manufacturers flat-out told them they could not support the business models needed to help pay for those 3G licenses. Governments in the U.K. and Germany are going to have to do something to help those carriers.” “Several carriers have said they don’t want to be first with third-generation services. Let the other guy make all the mistakes first and learn from those mistakes before rolling out your own service.”
“Hey, look! It’s Tom Jones.” (This was my comment. Later I found out that the one celebrity siting of my life was an impersonator. Viva Las Vegas!)
“With the GPRS delays announced, Cannes was like a morgue.”
“We provide an end-to-end solution.” And “We don’t have to wait for 3G. This is available today.” (These two sentences or some variation of them came from just about everyone introducing a new product or service. Any second now, carriers should have a plethora of end-to-end products and services to meet all of their third-generation needs from which to choose.)
“NextWave may just win back the licenses.” (And of course, NextWave’s entire carrier’s carrier strategy fits right in line with all the talk of mobile virtual network operators.)
“It’s important for us not to stumble again after WAP.”
