WASHINGTON-The U.S. Postal Service and UniSite Inc. are planning a major rollout of huge flagpole antennas in the East and Midwest, a development representing a technological breakthrough in antenna co-location technology and aesthetics that will test the willingness of communities to embrace 150-foot structures...
SAN FRANCISCO-AirTouch Communications Inc. and MediaOne Group, formerly U S West Media Group, completed merging MediaOne's U.S. cellular and personal communications services interests into AirTouch, said the carrier. The merger, valued at $5.9 billion, became effective last week.AirTouch acquired MediaOne's stake in PCS provider...
SnapTrack Inc., headquartered in San Jose, Calif., is attracting attention from some industry heavyweights with its Global Positioning System-based method for providing location-based services, including enhanced 911 service.Seven Code Division Multiple Access carriers are taking a serious look at what SnapTrack has to offer....
IRVINE, Calif.-AirTouch Southern California said it expanded its "all-Southern California home calling area," called California Connection, to its digital customers in San Diego.AirTouch customers can talk on their wireless phones from San Luis Obispo to the Mexico border at their local airtime rates, the...
BOSTON-In terms of dollars and labor, wireless number portability will cost wireless carriers more than any other single issue, according to the Yankee Group in its recently released report, Wireless Number Portability: A Bowl of Cherries for Competition ... but Just the Pits for Everyone...
WASHINGTON-Seeking to end a century-old "luxury" tax on telephony, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) along with House colleagues Jennifer Dunn (R-Wash.) and Billy Tauzin (R-La.) introduced bills aimed at repealing the 3-percent federal excise "tax on talking." With this action, McCain made good on a...
MONROE, La.-To encourage safe driving, Century Cellunet is offering at no cost hands-free devices to customers who purchase a Motorola Inc. Profile 300E wireless phone, said the company.The hands-free accessory, normally priced at $30, includes an ear piece and a microphone on a cord...
CALGARY, Alberta, Canada-Microcell Solutions Inc. launched personal communications services, branded Fido, throughout the greater Calgary area. The service uses Global System for Mobile communications technology.In Calgary, Fido PCS service is available from Canada Olympic Park to Falconridge, and from Calgary International Airport to Spruce...
NEW YORK-CTI Holdings S.A., a pure play wireless carrier serving the interior region of Argentina, plans to place privately up to $150 million to help finance its network construction.By the end of last year, CTI had deployed 698 cell sites, which covered about 95...
BOSTON-The future of wireless reselling is based on the resellers' ability to realize economies of scale, provide a wide scope of services and achieve brand awareness, according to a recently published report by the Yankee Group.Titled "Wireless Resale: Is There a Future?," the report estimated...
WASHINGTON-Unless it receives as-yet-undefined "higher and better alternatives" from potential buyers who would like to purchase the Dallas and Chicago C-block licenses from bankrupt Pocket Communications Inc., a group of Pocket's creditors may end up with those properties, with Pocket's remaining 41 licenses returning...
The Federal Communications Commission's Phase I E911 deadline is set for Wednesday, but that doesn't mean that dispatchers across the nation this week will begin receiving the extra information called for in the mandate.Phase I requires carriers to relay the Automatic Number Identification of...
Initially used as a tool to tap into the credit-challenged market, many carriers are finding that prepaid service is attracting more than those with bad credit.Many personal communications services carriers are reporting that as much as 50 percent of their subscriber bases are made...
Further extending its reach into the wireless industry, Sun Microsystems Inc. announced it has signed an agreement giving L.M. Ericsson license to use and distribute its PersonalJava platform and Java Application Environment.The Ericsson announcement comes less than two months after Motorola Inc. announced it...
WASHINGTON-Negotiations between the Justice Department and the telecom industry over a digital wiretap standard collapsed last week, an outcome that will pull the Federal Communications Commission into the fray and raise the stakes for a legislative fix.The Justice Department is expected shortly to file...
Like the ugly duckling that was teased and spurned in its younger years only to mature into a beautiful swan, the two-way paging market is expected to someday spread its wings and lift the paging industry to new heights of subscriber growth and increased...
NEW YORK-It has been said that where you stand depends on where you sit. And so it was earlier this month when representatives of four wireless carriers and four equipment vendors offered their views at a BT Alex. Brown forum on the interplay between...
WASHINGTON-As the Justice Department broadens its antitrust probe of WorldCom Inc.'s proposed $37 billion purchase of MCI Communications Corp., Rev. Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/Push Coalition is using the mega-merger as a springboard to advocate increased diversification in the booming telecommunications industry.Last week, Jackson, Federal Communications...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission denied a waiver request forwarded last December by AirTouch Communications Inc. that would have stayed any per-call pay-phone compensation until pay-phone service providers are able to provide pay-phone-specific coding digits to facilitate blocking.In an order released March 9, the commission...
NEW YORK-Field-programmable gate arrays are poised to become the next key driver in the trend toward smaller, less expensive, more powerful and more quickly deployable cell sites, according to a new report by Allied Business Intelligence, Oyster Bay, N.Y.Unlike the Application Specific Integrated Circuits...
The differences between paging resellers and carriers is perhaps most evident when looking at what happens to paging resellers that offer customers prepaid multiyear or lifetime contracts.The plan seems fairly simple at first-rather than signing customers to monthly service plans and collecting small checks...
Much hype has surrounded information services and what they mean to the future of the paging industry.By providing customers with information-such as news, sports scores and stock quotes-carriers hope to both change the perception of paging as a simple communications tool to that of...
WASHINGTON-Attorney General Janet Reno will decide by this Friday whether to pull the Federal Communications Commission into a digital wiretap controversy that kept the telecom industry and FBI officials busy last week in negotiations over a technical standard.The telecom industry, represented by wireless and...
NEW YORK-British Telecommunications plc announced its mobile satellite communications customers will enjoy price reductions up to 15 percent, when the company introduces a new U.S. dollar billing rate.BT will reduce the cost of calling from mobile terminals via the Inmarsat system. Customers on BT's...
