The Bluetooth Special Interest Group said it will begin working with ultra-wideband developers in combining the strength of both personal wireless area technologies. The Bluetooth SIG said the partnership will extend its long-term roadmap of advancing Bluetooth technology with higher-speed capabilities and allow UWB...
The GSM Association once again blasted proposed rates for licensing anti-piracy technology, calling recently revised rates "unreasonable and unworkable." The trade association of more than 600 wireless operators rejected the latest royalties proposal from licensing clearinghouse MPEG LA for digital rights management (DRM) software....
LAGUNA NIGUEL, Calif.-The OTA Flash Forum, which focuses on issues facing over-the-air management of mobile devices, said it added several new members to its ranks. New members are DAT Group, Nextel Communications Inc., SavaJe Technologies, Sicap, SIPTECH, SmartTrust and Wireless Services Corp.
WASHINGTON, D.C.-PCIA and tower company AAT Communications Corp., together with three state wireless associations, have launched a Web site aimed at helping other states form wireless associations.The site, www.swaprogram.net, includes a 10-page guide to starting a state wireless association as well as links to...
SUNOL, Calif.-The MultiMediaCard Association announced it will team with the Open Mobile Alliance standards group to develop copyright protection measures for removable MMC cards in mobile phones. Specifically, the MMCA said it will extend the OMA's digital rights management specifications to its SecureMMC version...
SAN RAMON, Calif.-The WiMedia Alliance said Microsoft Corp. has joined its effort to push standardization and adoption of ultra-wideband technology for high-speed wireless connectivity. The industry association, which recently joined forces with the MultiBand OFDM Alliance Special Interest Group, plans to release an initial...
OAKBROOK TERRACE, Ill.-Six radio-frequency identification companies are joining with the Computing Technology Industry Association to develop a vendor-neutral RFID certification, according to CompTIA.Organizations that have joined the effort included Briljent L.L.C., ODIN Technologies, RFID4U, RFID Journal, Sparkice and Symbol Technologies Inc.The companies this week...
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil-The CDMA Development Group said it has signed a memorandum of understanding with the International 450 Association, formerly the NMT Association, to cooperate on promoting CDMA2000 technologies in the 450 MHz band worldwide.The groups also agreed to work together on technology,...
WASHINGTON-CTIA said it has formed a working group to combat wireless-handset viruses."While electronic viruses-like human viruses-can never be completely eliminated, the industry is proactively taking steps to protect the security of wireless handsets and devices. Though wireless viruses are still rare, we intend to...
ARLINGTON, Va.-The Telecommunications Industry Association's board of directors elected eight new members at its meeting April 11 in Cambridge, Md.New board members are Michael Thurk, group vice president-enterprise at Avaya; Charlie Fox, general manager of Tyco; Carlos Munoz, chief executive officer of Cam Communications...
ARLINGTON, Va.-The Consumer Electronics Association, which represents more than 2,000 corporate members, said it has created the Wireless Product Specialist Study Guide designed to aid the wireless retail community in training sales staff and provide better service to consumers.CEA said the 200-page guide, which...
ALEXANDRIA, Va.-PCIA said more than $750 million was spent relocating about 3,600 microwave links under its Microwave Clearinghouse program.The clearinghouse, a collaborative venture created in 1996 among PCS carriers that operated under the PCIA umbrella, provided cost-sharing activities for microwave relocation in the 1850...
SAN RAMON, Calif.-The ZigBee Alliance announced four ZigBee-compliant platforms from Chipcon, CompXs, Ember and Freescale Semiconductor Inc.The alliance conducted testing of the platforms to ensure interoperability via its official test houses, National Technical Systems Inc. and TUV Rheinland. It also used analysis tools from...
BELLEVUE, Wash.-3G Americas elected Andrew Corp. to its board of governors.The company said it will be represented on the board by JC Huang and Ray Butler.Other board of governors members are Cingular Wireless, Cable & Wireless (West Indies), Ericsson, Gemplus, Hewlett-Packard Co., Lucent Technologies...
SAN FRANCISCO-The Game Developers Association said Thursday it has formed a committee to act as a resource for mobile game developers, publishers, researchers and aggregators. The Mobile Game Development Special Interest Group (Mobile-SIG) is designed to offer a source for industrywide views, collaboration and...
CAMBRIDGE, United Kingdom-TTPCom said the Open Mobile Alliance has re-elected its senior software architect, Lars Brenk, as the chairman of OMA's Game Services Working Group.Brenk will focus on interoperability specifications, APIs and protocols for network-enabled gaming in his role as chairman. The working group's...
PISCATAWAY, N.J.-IEEE said it has approved work to begin on an amendment to the 802.11 standard for wireless local area networks.The project involves a WLAN standard amendment for WLAN devices to support protection of management frames, said the group. IEEE P802.11w will provide enhancements...
HERNDON, Va.-The Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions sent representatives from its member companies to meet with the European Telecommunication Standards Institute TISPAN Committee last week in Herndon, Va., to discuss standardization activities and future plans for next-generation networks. The meeting participants agreed to pursue...
WASHINGTON-The Association of Public-safety Communications Officials last month broke with other public-safety advocates and the telecommunications industry, refusing to support a report to the FCC's Network Reliability & Interoperability Council. "While NRIC VII work group 1A was chartered to minimize the conflicting ambiguous language...
The backlash against proposed rates to license digital rights management technology continued this week, with a powerful group of wireless carriers threatening to abandon the open-standard system.The GSM Association blasted royalties for the technology proposed earlier this year by the MPEG Licensing Authority for...
WASHINGTON-The Congressional Budget Office said that financing universal-service subsidies out of general revenues would have a lesser economic cost than the current system of cross subsidization."Funding universal service with general revenues would sever the current relationship between telecommunications industry revenues and universal-service funding," reads...
WASHINGTON-Come Friday, the Industrial Telecommunications Association is set to become the Enterprise Wireless Alliance as it expands its focus and merges with the American Mobile Telecommunications Association. "New and innovative technologies that promote enterprise business productivity, the ability to compete effectively and contribute to...
A trade association of mobile operators and content providers took up the fight against a group of technology companies it said is looking to overcharge for anti-piracy software. In a prepared statement, the Mobile Entertainment Forum (MEF) blasted a proposal by MPEG LA to...
WASHINGTON-The mobile-phone industry may ask the Supreme Court to review a federal appeals court ruling that breathed new life into five class-action lawsuits alleging cellular firms could have better protected consumers from mobile-phone radiation harm by supplying them with headsets. Last Wednesday, the 4th...
