WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission and Underwriters Laboratories certified Northern Telecom's 1.9 GHz personal communications services network equipment, the company said.Nortel said its radio base station equipment, based on PCS 1900 Global System for Mobile communications technology, complies with parts 15, 24 and 68 of...
Launching personal communications services with a multitude of standards may be the way for industry to sort out the benefits of each technology, but it could set consumers up for chaos and confusion, said longtime wireless architect Jesse Russell.The AT&T Bell Laboratories engineer is...
Groups battling for unlicensed spectrum at 5 GHz to create a high-speed data system agree there is industry support for such a service, but the details now are in the hands of the Federal Communications Commission.Apple Computer Inc. petitioned the FCC in May to...
WASHINGTON-The entrepreneur block auction for personal communications services licenses that was to begin next week has been postponed again in what has turned into a legal quagmire and an embarrassing setback for the Federal Communications Commission.A lawsuit filed last month by Omnipoint Corp., which...
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Reed Hundt last week announced plans to reduce the agency's work force by 10 percent as well as close certain field offices around the country.Hundt's recommendations, which now go before the five-member agency, come as House Republicans prepare to downsize...
As major service providers work to gain position for the coming pocket-phone revolution, Sprint Corp. is letting loose of its cellular holdings in order to concentrate on its personal communications services licenses.Sprint has announced it intends to pursue a tax-free spinoff of its cellular...
Editor's Note: The RCR research and editorial departments have compiled this list of mobile satellite carriers based on survey responses and interviews with industry contacts. The chart is arranged alphabetically because most of the companies are not yet offering service.Inmarsat-P has been spun off as...
WASHINGTON-Resale could become a powerful force in wireless telephony in the coming years, bringing an odd mix of competition and commerce to facilities-based carriers.Resale has experienced modest success in the 12-year-old cellular industry, but the infusion of more spectrum (120 megahertz) and new competition...
WASHINGTON-Congress is studying different approaches to spectrum reform in light of the $14 billion that lawmakers and the Clinton administration hope to extract from the airwaves during the next seven years.The Federal Communications Commission has raised $9 billion to date from selling licenses for...
The dirty little secret is the $7 billion auction of broadband personal communications services licenses was not necessarily a big success.Reed Hundt, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, would probably disagree. He's made a career of auctioning PCS licenses over the past year.The FCC...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission is considering abandoning the 220-222 MHz test-bed for narrowband technology in favor of a flexible licensing scheme that would permit alternative technologies for services other than dispatch such as paging, data and fixed wireless.The July 28 proposal comes in the...
WASHINGTON-Commercial wireless carriers last week fought off a challenge by two Virginia congressmen and local government officials to kill the antenna siting amendment in the House telecommunications reform bill.The legislation, significantly revised at the request of House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., on behalf of...
Despite intensifying doubt regarding the outlook for entrepreneurial block personal communications services auctions, AirGate LLC of Atlanta announced it intends to bid for licenses in the C block.AirGate is a start-up venture formed to enter the PCS market, through a unit called AirLink, and...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission and Omnipoint Corp. appeared to be close to negotiating a deal late last week on how to prevent big companies from taking illegal control of bidders who win personal communications services licenses at the upcoming entrepreneur block auction.The auction is...
WASHINGTON-The United States will seek additional spectrum for voice and data low-earth-orbit global satellite systems at the World Radiocommunication Conference this fall in Geneva."We've worked closely with the private sector to achieve what we believe will provide our industry and this country with the...
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.-Omnipoint Corp. has licensed its composite Code Division Multiple Access/Time Division Multiple Access technology to JRC International Inc. to produce personal communications services handsets.Omnipoint said its CDMA/TDMA PCS technology has been approved by U.S. standards bodies as Interim Standard-661. The company was...
WASHINGTON-New telephone number policies embraced by federal regulators will benefit the wireless telecommunications industry, which accounts for two of every three new telephone numbers established. The wireless community previously has had to rely on an entity controlled by the seven regional Bell telephone companies...
As the cellular marketplace prepares to shift from a duopoly to a business where more than a handful of providers may offer service, industry analysts agree competition for wireless customers is likely to ignite. Key cellular carriers that won big in the personal communications...
WASHINGTON-The first system and billing identification codes for personal communications services have been assigned to AT&T Wireless Services by Cibernet Corp.Cibernet is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association, which urged the assignment of codes so PCS carriers could proceed with negotiations...
WASHINGTON-The cellular industry continues to be shaped by the forces of deregulation and regulatory parity mandated in 1993 legislation passed by the then Democratic-controlled Congress and implemented on an on-going basis by the Federal Communications Commission.The same trends are expected to continue as the...
Creating a nongovernmental United States Numbering Association to administer phone numbers will offer "an independent administrator, with a neutral governing board for which all carriers will be eligible," said the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association.CTIA recently proposed USNA to the Federal Communications Commission. The FCC...
It is not an understatement to say The Progress & Freedom Foundation's plan to abolish the Federal Communications Commission within three years and replace it with a smaller office in the executive brance, was greeted with skepticism from the Washington press corps last week.Perhaps...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission will vote next week on positions the United States may take at a major international conference in Geneva this fall, amid charges that the microwave and personal communications services industries might get shortchanged.At issue is an industry recommendation to reallocate...
WASHINGTON-The House telecommunications subcommittee last week approved creating an industry-government panel to craft federal antenna siting guidelines and temporarily derailed a wireless resale proposal to regulate commercial mobile radio carriers like regional Bell telephone companies.The antenna siting measure, offered by Scott Klug, R-Wis., and...
