NEW YORK-Boston Communications Group Inc. launched a prepaid wireless service called Passport, which it said is the first in the United States to permit calls from any wireless phone to anywhere in the world.Rogers Cantel Inc., Canada's largest wireless carrier, introduced a nationwide version...
WASHINGTON-In an embarrassing political blunder that lends insight into the tricky third-generation wireless debate, Sen. Chuck Robb (D-Va.) last week joined two fellow Finance Committee members in urging the Clinton administration to use renewed Super 301 trade authority to make Europe open its market...
Never has an industry been so vastly underestimated as the cellular industry in its formative years.When the industry celebrated its 10th birthday in late 1993, industry watchers joked about how wrong the early subscriber forecasts were, while putting out new subscriber forecasts that underestimated...
WASHINGTON-Thomas Wheeler, the president and chief executive of the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association, does not want to enter the 'holy war' between local and long-distance companies. Rather, he wants to focus on what is best for the wireless industry. And, what is best for...
MOUNTAIN LAKES, N.J.-A study conducted by Solomon-Wolff Associates showed AT&T Corp. has the highest level of satisfaction among the three largest long-distance companies.The study reported that among Internet users, for both local and telephone wireless service, BellSouth Mobility customers were "by far the most...
When BellSouth Wireless Data L.P. introduced its Interactive Paging service at PCS '98 last year, Senior Vice President of Strategic Marketing Janet Boudris said she expected financial applications to be a big driver of the two-way messaging paradigm.If recent announcements are any indication, that...
Representatives from BellSouth Corp., AirTouch Communications Inc. and GTE Corp. last week met with Federal Communications Commission representatives to discuss AirCell Inc.'s petition for a waiver of the airborne cellular rule.The discussion with representatives from the Commercial Wireless Division of the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau...
NEW YORK-w-Trade announced its Wireless Internet Trading System now supports both the Research In Motion Inter@ctive 950 handheld wireless device, as well as those on Palm Computing Inc.'s platform, such as the PalmPilot and the Palm III from 3Com Corp.w-Trade's solution can be used...
WOODBRIDGE, N.J.-BellSouth Wireless Data L.P. announced it is offering Nettech Systems' Smart IP product over its wireless data network.Smart IP allows Internet Protocol applications to run over non-IP-based wireless networks without modification. The agreement allows BellSouth to offer other Nettech products, including InstantRF and...
MarketwaveRichard Bryan is the new senior vice president of sales and marketing at Marketwave Corp. Bryan previously worked for AT&T Wireless Services Inc. as its vice president of sales and marketing, in charge of staff, national accounts and retail sales.Kansas CellularKansas Cellular announced several...
BIRMINGHAM, Ala.-Several leading voice messaging companies in North America have formed the TeleMessaging Industry Association, aimed at better educating the public about the benefits of voice mail and messaging services, and thereby increasing their use.Founding members include Ameritech Corp., Bell Atlantic Corp., Bell Canada,...
Power ProductsPower Products Unlimited Inc. selected Ken Donofrio as its new marketing director. He will orchestrate all aspects of the company's marketing and carrier services program. Donofrio previously was director of marketing and carrier support for Cliffco Wireless.WirelessNorthWirelessNorth promoted its market development coordinator, Heidi...
TORONTO, Ontario, Canada-Rogers Cantel Inc. announced plans to introduce an all-in-one messaging service Feb. 1 in Canada, using the Inter@ctive 950 pager from Research in Motion Ltd.The Cantel AT&T Interactive Messaging service will allow users to send and respond to messages between the RIM...
ORLANDO, Fla.-Bellcore announced its AirBoss Wireless Solutions unit will offer access to Lotus Domino databases via the Inter@ctive 950 two-way pager from Research In Motion Ltd.Users of the pager and the BellSouth Intelligent Wireless Network will gain real-time access to Lotus Notes Mail, Director,...
BellSouth Cellular Corp. announced it will invest in designing software-defined radio technology, a move that could give momentum to the rest of the wireless industry to change the way handsets are produced.The idea of developing a wireless handset that can operate on any air...
WASHINGTON-President Clinton's renewal last week of a potent trade weapon-known as Super 301-could become a vehicle for prying open markets closed to U.S. wireless technologies.Super 301, a multistep process that calls for bilateral negotiations on trade disputes but can lead to retaliatory action, was...
NEW YORK-Muriel Siebert & Co. introduced the Siebert MobileBroker, a wireless financial service that allows users to trade stocks, receive reports, get stock quotes and alerts, and send and receive e-mail.The solution uses BellSouth Wireless Data L.P.'s network and the Inter@ctive 950 paging device...
Just as paging carriers look to two-way paging as a means of differentiation into the next millennium, so do paging manufacturers.In the past, a one-way pager was pretty much the same all over. Even the new lines of 1.5-way, or guaranteed messaging, pagers based...
Companies already are feeling the pinch from Brazil's falling currency, which, at RCR press time, had lost about 20 percent of its value against the U.S. dollar since Brazil's central bank first moved to devalue the real.BellSouth Corp. said it will record a foreign...
AGOURA HILLS, Calif.-Incumbent cellular carriers are providing formidable competition to personal communications services carriers, according to J.D. Power and Associates' Personal Communications Services Report, which is an offshoot of the company's 1998 Wireless Satisfaction study covering 21 markets.Cellular carriers have transitioned their networks to...
Research In Motion Ltd. introduced a wireless e-mail solution, called BlackBerry, designed to allow Microsoft Exchange users mobile access to their desktop e-mail.BlackBerry is an end-to-end solution that combines the Inter@ctive 950 pager from RIM with e-mail/organizer software, a PC docking cradle, desktop software,...
Bundling continues to push forward, albeit at a slow pace.A recent Arthur Andersen survey of telecommunications companies found 66 percent of respondents offer bundled services to business customers, and 61 percent are offering these services to residential customers. About 71 percent of long-distance carriers...
WASHINGTON-Federal Communications Commissioner Susan Ness last week added her voice to the growing drumbeat of U.S. opposition to European Union moves that could block the import of third-generation mobile phone technologies and limit harmonization of similar standards."A major concern I share with other U.S....
WASHINGTON-A federal court of appeals on Friday upheld the Federal Communications Commission's spectrum cap. The decision comes as the FCC is examining whether to remove the restriction that limits carriers to 45 megahertz in a given geographic area.BellSouth Wireless Inc. had challenged the spectrum...
