NEW YORK-Start-up American companies searching the financing firmament for venture capital might do better by setting their sights upward toward the hidden realm occupied by angels.Angel investors are high-net-worth people whose small, patient investments in fledgling companies play a unique and critical role at...
The introduction of digital phone technology has changed dramatically the landscape of wireless communications across the globe and put the heat on the global paging industry.Paging's old advantages of small size and cheaper service are being whittled away, as digital phones shrink in size...
At the end of each year, the RCR editorial staff looks back on the news events that made RCR headlines and decides which were the most significant, industry-impacting stories of the past 12 months. Here are our picks for 1998.1. March 16IPR issues spark...
FORT LEE, N.J.-MobileMedia Corp. announced the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware approved its disclosure statement, allowing the company to move forward with its plan to merge with Arch Communications Group Inc.The plan contains terms of the proposed merger with Arch, which...
Supra Products Inc. won a contract from AT&T Wireless Services Inc. to provide its TRACcess electronic access control system at AT&T Wireless cell sites in its central region, said the companies.The contract follows a previous contract with AT&T Wireless covering the carrier's Western region...
WASHINGTON-Daniel Phythyon, capping a stormy year-and-a-half stewardship of the Federal Communications Commission's Wireless Telecommunications Bureau, which had him under constant siege from feisty bankruptcy lawyers, angry lawmakers and high-powered lobbyists, said he will step down Dec. 1."The timing was my decision," said Phythyon. "The...
MELBOURNE, Australia-Telstra Corp., Australia's largest communications company, announced it is getting out of the paging business. It hopes to complete the sale to Link Telecommunications Pty. Ltd. by October, giving Link about a two-thirds share of the market. Telstra made its announcement on the...
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa-The long-awaited launch of cellular service in Botswana is expected to have a huge impact on the country's communications and business sector.Botswana's small population of 1.47 million people was seen as a main reason for the delay. Proposals for cellular can be...
Compared with defining-and keeping-the same wireless strategy over the years, gambling is beginning to look like a sound way to sock some money away for retirement.In today's frenetic telecom environment, it increasingly is difficult to decide which strategy to pursue.Should a telecom carrier try...
The head of Philips Consumer Communications quit last week amidst the company's announcement it doesn't expect to break even this year.PCC President and Chief Executive Officer Mike McTighe resigned from those positions effective Oct. 1.When Lucent Technologies Inc. and Philips Electronics N.V. hatched the...
Watching a cellular handset manufacturer that was once on top of the market exit from the U.S. handset business has broken Mal Gurian's heart.The one-time president of Oki telecom, since renamed Oki Telecom Inc., considered the company his family."We had all the top people...
The quest for international partnerships continued last week as AT&T Corp. announced a $10 billion joint-venture plan with British Telecommunications plc to more strongly position itself in the global market.AT&T and BT July 26 said they have agreed to pool their international operations and...
NEW YORK-Harris Corp., Melbourne, Fla., announced July 20 a work force reduction of 2,300, or 8 percent, due primarily to weakness in the semiconductor market, said the company. The company also said it planned to exit the analog base station business.About 1,900 of the...
Signing one of its largest ever pacts, CommQuest Technologies Inc. said it will supply its GSM-XL chipset to Audiovox Communications Corp. for a new Global System for Mobile communications handset.Terms of the agreement call for CommQuest, a recent IBM Corp. acquisition, to supply its...
As the digital revolution begins to move at a substantial pace, mobile phone manufacturers have some tough decisions to make.The demand for digital handsets is growing, especially in the CDMA arena, where carriers are screaming for more handsets. More cellular carriers aggressively are pushing...
BANGALORE, India-Losing more than US$5 million per month, paging service providers in India face a grim situation. The paging industry has halved its service penetration targets from 6 million pagers by the turn of century to 3 million, despite an impressive 25-percent growth rate...
AT&T Corp. last week stepped outside of the telecommunications industry to buy the nation's second-largest cable company, Tele-Communications Inc. The move is the latest in a string of mega-mergers involving communications companies.The stock transaction, valued at $48 billion including debt, is thought mainly to...
A wave of activity between carriers and tower management firms appears to be developing, signaling a growing trend toward carriers selling off their tower assets in purchase/leaseback arrangements.In such transactions, carriers sell their towers to a tower management company and then lease back the...
Cable & Wireless Communications plc confirmed the company is in negotiations with four mobile telecommunications operators in the United Kingdom for the possible sale of its mobile services division.The company is talking with Vodafone Group plc, Orange plc, Cellnet (owned by British Telecommunications plc...
NEW YORK-And now let's have a round of applause for top executives of Arch Communications Group Inc., Paging Network Inc. and SkyTel Corp.These successful emigres from wireless telephony have spearheaded a positive reversal of fortune not only for their paging companies but also for...
Sprint Corp. is expected to announce this week a plan that would restructure its ownership in Sprint Spectrum L.P. and allow its cable partners to exit the business.Sprint confirmed that it has made substantial progress in negotiating with its three cable partners-Tele-Communications Inc., Comcast...
Personal communications services carrier BellSouth Mobility DCS said it is offering an enhanced voice-mail service called RapidReply to customers in the Carolinas, eastern Tennessee and coastal Georgia.With the new service, customers do not have to exit voice mail or dial a caller's telephone number...
MINNEAPOLIS-ADC Telecommunications Inc. opened a $26 million, 284,000 square-foot manufacturing facility in Shakopee, Minn., near its Minneapolis headquarters.ADC's Broadband Connectivity Group is housed in the new facility. The BCG makes broadband connectivity products for wireless, twisted pair copper, fiber-optic and coaxial networks.To keep workers...
NEW YORK-Motorola Inc., Schaumburg, Ill., reported higher sales and earnings for the fourth quarter of 1997 and for all of last year, but slightly below analysts' expectations due to the unsettled condition of its Asian markets.Christopher Galvin, chief executive officer, said the company expects...
