WASHINGTON-Wireless carriers next year will begin paying nearly 6 percent of their interstate and international revenues to the federal universal-service fund, according to figures provided by the FCC's Common Carrier Bureau.Even though this assessment used to be about 3 percent, the Federal Communications Commission...
Telstreet.com announced it offers wireless phones, service and accessories online. "Telstreet.com takes responsibility for the entire customer experience from buying to fulfillment to delivery of the order," said Terry Dwyer, president and chief executive officer of Telstreet.com. "Consumers are guaranteed to find the wireless...
Tired of listening to the same dry quarterly conference calls? Try listening to Bob Price, chief executive officer of rural cellular operator Price Communications Corp. He's sure to add some color to your life.Last week, the fiery CEO hammered a stock downgrade from Dillon...
AT&T Wireless Services Inc. said capacity problems and handset shortages constrained the company's ability to add subscribers in the third quarter.The nation's largest wireless operator added 269,000 subscribers in the third quarter, down 17.4 percent from the previous year and down significantly from 473,000...
WASHINGTON-Lost in the hoopla over the enactment of wireless 911 legislation last week is the growing prospect that the rollout of position location for the nation's 80 million mobile-phone users will be seriously delayed in the same way that caller identification is far behind...
LONDON-Orange, the United Kingdom's third-largest mobile operator, announced it is offering a new prepaid package, called Just Talk, that makes clear all conditions and charges upfront and offers existing prepaid subscribers the option of switching to a contract tariff, while still being able to...
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa-Wireless local loop (WLL) is currently the most popular access technology to supply basic voice connectivity to subscribers in the rural areas of many African nations. It is an expensive option and difficult to implement, but offers the most effective way of...
BETHESDA, Md.-Omnipoint Corp. has signed agreements to acquire East/West Communications Inc.EWCM holds five licenses covering about 22.2 million pops in Los Angeles; Washington, D.C.; Sarasota, Fla.; Reno, Nev.; and Santa Barbara, Calif.Omnipoint said it invested $3 million into EWCM today for 300,000 shares and...
There was a time, not so long ago, when reasonably priced voice service with decent coverage delighted most wireless subscribers. But subscribers soon were demanding the same features-like voice mail, caller ID and three-way calling-offered on wireline phones.These features, previously known as enhanced services,...
While Ericsson AB's third-quarter net income fell, rival Nokia posted a 38-percent jump in third-quarter net profit to $687 million and expects full sales growth of 40 percent.Ericsson's net income in the third quarter was less than expected, however, slipping to $319 million from...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission, which has been asked to declare whether federal law pre-empts state courts from awarding monetary damages against wireless carriers in consumer fraud cases, may have tipped its hand on how the matter might be decided.In an amicus (friend of the...
The wireless industry is waiting to see how many customers are attracted to Sprint PCS Group's wireless Internet services, but they will have to wait at least another quarter.Sprint PCS, which launched nationwide wireless Web service in late September, said it's too early to...
GENEVA-Sonera, the Finnish telecommunications operator, announced it plans to enter the wireless portal business. The company said it initially will focus its efforts on Western Europe and the United States, competing head to head with U.S. firms such as Phone.com.Called Sonera Zed, the service...
NEW YORK-Western Wireless Corp. plans to begin offering competitive local exchange services in a few Minnesota towns by year-end now that it has become the first mobile carrier to gain eligibility for Universal Service Funds."We will make things up as we go along because...
Lithium Technology Corp., Plymouth Meeting, Pa., and Pacific Lithium Ltd., Auckland, New Zealand, signed a deal last week to merge and form a new corporation based in the United States."The new combined entity would have a unique position in the lithium polymer battery market,...
NEW YORK-"We've done the really easy stuff, and now the fun begins," Ivan Seidenberg, chairman and chief executive officer of Bell Atlantic Corp., said in a keynote address Oct. 7 at Fall Internet World '99.The Internet has evolved rapidly from its genesis as a...
WASHINGTON-The Clinton administration may have misled American telecom firms by suggesting that problems created by Beijing's ouster of wireless and wireline investors in China Unicom could be ironed out by year's end as part of negotiations over China's membership in the World Trade Organization.But...
Now that small and rural cellular operators have become an integral piece of large operators' nationwide calling plans and consumers demand more advanced services, many small carriers could feel pressure to move to third-generation-type technologies faster than anticipated.Smaller carriers in recent years haven't found...
WASHINGTON-A top wireless safety expert has taken umbrage at Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association President Thomas Wheeler's call for speedier work on the development of a standard to measure mobile-phone radiation absorbed by the head."We know that the committee has already completed a great deal...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission reached a tentative agreement with state regulators on what type of notification will be heard when a person calls a calling-party-pays wireless subscriber, said Kris Monteith, chief of the policy division of the FCC's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau.It is really a...
NEW YORK-China Telecom (Hong Kong), which provides cellular service in three Chinese provinces, plans to raise $500 million in a global bond offering, according to Standard & Poor's Corp.The debt issue, a planned $1.65 billion stock sale and a $3.95 billion equity asset swap...
While carriers publicly push ahead with their third-generation technology migration plans, behind the scenes, some may be evaluating technology conversions that could be more cost effective in the long run.Sources close to AT&T Corp. say the nationwide telecommunications carrier is technically studying Code Division...
NEW YORK-Illuminet Holdings Inc., which calls itself the largest unaffiliated Signaling System 7 network provider in the country, plans an initial public offering of 3.9 million shares priced between $14.50 and $16.50 each.Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, New York, is lead underwriter for the proposed...
The biggest challenge for wireless operators during the next four years most likely will be obtaining additional spectrum, according to Keith Radousky, director of engineering, BellSouth Cellular Corp. "(Wireless) data is going to take off similar to how it took off in the wireline...
