2003

SAN JOSE, Calif.-The wireless industry today can take a minute to pat itself on the back as it looks back exactly 30 years ago to the very first time a …

OYSTER BAY, N.Y.-Speech recognition technologies will play an important role in the financial services and telecommunications industries, according to a new study from Allied Business Intelligence, and will push the …

MOSCOW-Russia witnessed a 21.12 million phone users at the end of march, representing a 17-percent jump from the end of 2002, according to telecom consultancy AC&M. Most of the net …

SUNNYVALE, Calif.-The heated and rancorous legal battle between corporate wireless e-mail companies Research In Motion Ltd. and Good Technology Inc. moved another step forward, with a California judge denying RIM’s …

LOS ANGELES-Bluetooth manufacturer Blue-Gene.com said it will begin marketing its BT-300C Bluetooth Compact Flash card targeted at Pocket PC and notebook computers. The company said the card is bundled with …

PHILADELPHIA, United States-Morgan Stanley cut its rating on the U.S. telecommunications industry to “cautious” from “in line,” according to a Reuters report. The firm cited the recent strong stock performance …

LONDON-Arabic news network Al Jazeera said it will offer a breaking news service to mobile-phone users. The text messaging service, operated through content company PervasiveEdge, will feature around 60 news …

TOKYO-NTT DoCoMo said it will launch a new satellite mobile handset that provides 64 kilobits per second (kbps) packet communications. Users of the satellite mobile-phone handset called “Widestar Duo” can …

BEIJING-China Unicom announced it had completed upgrading its CDMA network to CDMA 1x, enabling a host of new services, including multimedia messages and high-speed Internet access. The new CDMA 1x …

MANILA, The Philippines-Ayala-owned Globe Telecom announced it posted a consolidated net income of 6.84 billion Philippine pesos (US$129 million) in 2002, 59-percent higher than the 4.3 billion pesos (US$81.1 million) …

TOKYO-More than 70 percent of NTT DoCoMo’s i-mode service users said they are using or would like to use online shopping services via i-mode, Info Plant Company, a leading online …

OSLO, Norway-Norway’s Reitan Group, a retail giant best known for its grocery chain and franchise holdings, made a bid for Sense Communications International, the country’s largest mobile virtual network operator …

SURABAYA, Indonesia-Indosat confirmed its plan to merge its cellular subsidiaries Satelindo and Indosat-M3 in compliance with the company’s strategy to strengthen its core business in the cellular sector in addition …

MOSCOW-The Russian Communications Ministry finally gave the go-ahead for Bluetooth technology to develop in the country, and satisfied producers and dealers are predicting a sales boom. The State Commission for …

MELBOURNE, Australia-Vodafone announced it will launch its Vodafone Live! service from 21 April. The service offering will include multimedia messaging service (MMS) and polyphonic ring tones. At the same time, …

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina-Porta, owned by Am

OXFORD, United Kingdom—In the event of a terror attack on London, the government said it is planning to swamp cell-phone users with short message services (SMSs) in the style of …

BEIJING—Hong Kong is suffering from a mysterious illness called Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). On 1 April, a rumor surfaced that the whole city would be quarantined and cut off …

TOKYO-Oki Electric, a leading electronic manufacturer in Japan, plans to expand sales for semiconductors for PHS handsets to meet far-expanding demand for PHS units in Asia, the firm said Wednesday. …

BOSTON-Speech technology provider SpeechWorks International Inc. announced Bob Kellegrew has joined as vice president and general counsel. Kellegrew joins the company from American Tower Corp. where he served in a …

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DUBLIN, Ireland-Scottish firm Eurosource Europe announced plans to establish a presence in the United States, having carved a lucrative niche in Europe. The company said it has recycled 150,000 mobile …

OXFORD, United Kingdom-Following the acquisition in March of wireless local are network (WLAN) operators Megastream and Munich-based WLAN, fixed-line carrier Swisscom, which now has more than 800 WLAN access points, …

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina-The National Telecommunications Commission in Honduras prequalified BellSouth, Entel Chile and Megatel-EMCE for the band A personal communications services (PCS) cellular telephone license for which 18 companies had …

BEIJING—In a report entitled “Management and Development of China Telecom in 2003,” equipment manufacturer Zhongxing Telecom (ZTE) predicted fixed-line carrier China Telecom will adopt W-CDMA technology as its third-generation (3G) …