Canadian controversy, ehWhile the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association and its patrons were whooping it up last week in New Orleans, Canada was working itself into a frenzy over an issue that once was big in the "lower 48" before folks here succumbed to battle...
NEW YORK-OmniAmerica Inc., Albuquerque, N.M., announced the Department of Justice Antitrust Division approved its merger with American Tower Corp., Boston.OmniAmerica and American Tower announced Nov. 16 their plan to merge through an exchange of the companies' stock.Separately, American Tower sold an add-on offering of...
At CTIA's Wireless '99: The Jambala Wireless Application Protocol Gateway, which will allow operators to improve and expand wireless data services to their customers, said the company.An open-application platform, the Jambala WAP Gateway is a network node that serves as a bridge between the...
After years of slowly gathering the needed partnerships with cellular operators across the country, Cellemetry L.L.C. today can offer its cellular control channel transmission technology across more than 90 percent of the country.In mid-December, the company signed with Houston Cellular, adding much of Texas...
Triton Network Systems Inc. is aiming to give competitive local exchange carriers a wireless alternative to building fiber-optic networks to get into the local loop, yet keep the same quality associated with fiber-optics.Capitalizing on an exclusive design from Lockheed Martin Electronics and Missiles Co.,...
effrey Silva Can your beer do that? The National League of Cities, which just wrapped up its 75th annual meeting in Kansas City, boasts to members of forcing the withdrawal of the cellular industry's petition before the FCC seeking to pre-empt local zoning moratoria;...
Wireless product distributor Intellicell Corp. was the industry's top stock story last week when its stock quadrupled in value after a series of company announcements designed to turn around the struggling firm.The company Nov. 20 completed a private placement of $1.5 million in convertible...
CINCINNATI-Harris Corp. announced it acquired Intraplex Inc., which Harris plans to integrate into its Broadcast Systems Division.Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed. Intraplex develops integrated digital network access products for wireless and broadcast networks. Clients include Western Wireless Corp. and Ericsson Inc.
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission last week officially proposed rules that could lead to the end of spectrum caps. Additionally, the FCC announced rules to relocate incumbents in the 2 GHz spectrum band that has been allocated to mobile satellite services.Both decisions could have dramatic...
For some time, the paging industry has looked to information services as one possible means to increase revenue, but several technological obstacles have restricted the level of customization required for such services to offer real value.Last week, those obstacles were cleared when 11 paging...
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla.-ANI Site Development announced it signed a new agreement to manage all of Renda Broadcasting Corp.'s broadcast towers.ANI manages more than 200 communications sites in the Southeast. Renda has towers in Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, Florida and Georgia.
OXFORD, United Kingdom-Cellular penetration rates now exceed 50 percent in Finland. But real penetration rates are much higher if you ignore the very old and the very young. Pretty well every Finn who can walk and talk now has a mobile phone.Amongst Finnish youth,...
MELBOURNE, Australia-I am window shopping when my mobile phone alerts me I have a message. Reading it, I learn the store I am standing in front of has a sale on men's underwear. Forever in need of a new pair of boxer shorts, I...
Consolidation among heavyweights in the telecommunications industry, including some of the wireless sector's largest carriers, has grabbed the headlines during the last several months. Meanwhile, the tower industry has been experiencing a rapid consolidation of its own.Since the beginning of this month, American Tower...
NEW YORK-Stock-market volatility has caused 160 companies that filed for initial public offerings this year, half of them in the third quarter, to delay or cancel those plans, according to Securities Data Corp., Newark, N.J.That's the good news. Now many of those same companies...
Last month marked the first anniversary of the Federal Communications Commission's revised radio-frequency radiation guidelines. Those guidelines constituted the first major overhaul of RF rules in nearly a decade and the only one since wireless entered the high-tech era of personal communications services, digital...
Nearly a year into office, Bill Kennard has defied all attempts to be pigeonholed as the newest chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He was general counsel and an understudy to former FCC chief Reed Hundt. Yet Kennard is not Hundt like. He's not...
GLOBECOM SYSTEMSGlobecomm Systems Inc. announced commercial availability of its Systems Explorer II Portable Satphone, a satellite phone system that uses Integrated Services Digital Network technology. Explorer II is made in the United States and weighs 32 pounds. The system can be configured from the...
NEW YORK-After dramatically reducing the size and price of its initial public offering, Crown Castle International Corp., a Houston-based wireless tower company, sold 14 million shares at $13 each Aug. 18.The company had registered June 19 with the Securities and Exchange Commission to sell...
NEW YORK-After significantly reducing the size and price of its offering, ICO Global Communications Ltd., London, went public July 31, selling 10 million common stock shares at $12 each.Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette Securities Corp., New York, lead managed the initial public offering, which had...
COMSTREAMJohn F. Hodgson joined ComStream Corp. as vice president of human resources. Before ComStream, Hodgson held the same position with NextWave Telecom, San Diego, and prior to that with General Communications Inc., Anchorage, Alaska. He also has been the director of human resources for...
A number of new licenses will be up for grabs early next year in the United States as the majority of C-block Personal Communications Services licensees opted to return their licenses to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The FCC said 175 licenses will be...
BEIJING-Singapore Telecom has pulled out of the US$650 million Asia-Pacific Mobile Telecommunications (AMPT) satellite project it set up in December 1995 together with ST Telemedia, a subsidiary of the Singapore Technologies Group, and four Chinese partners: China Satellite Launch and Tracking Control, China Aero-Space Corp.,...
COLUMBUS, Ohio-SmarTalk TeleServices Inc. acquired Worldwide Direct, a direct-to-consumer prepaid cellular phone distributor, in a stock-for-stock transaction that provides it with terminal-based prepaid capability.Combined with SmarTalk's alliance with Boston Communications Group and the recent acquisition of Debit Cellular Network Technology, the Worldwide Direct acquisition...
