JERUSALEM-Bezeq Israel Telecom Ltd., the state-owned telecommunications company, announced a plan to allow cellular telephone users to route incoming calls through either their mobile phones or the nearest fixed-line phones. The proposed One Phone service requires government approval.The company said it hopes to reach...
TOKYO-An NTT laboratory is gearing up its efforts to develop Advanced Wireless Access (AWA), a next-generation wireless system that will enable users to access data at a speed of up to 36 Megabits per second (Mbps).NTT Network Service Systems Laboratories in Yokosuka City, Kanagawa...
The UMTS Forum said it welcomed proposals by the Asia-Pacific Telecommunity Conference Preparatory Group (APG) for adoption of the 2520-2670 MHz band to support the terrestrial component of IMT-2000. APG proposed that administrations make up to 160 megahertz of additional spectrum available for IMT-2000.AustraliaVirgin...
NEW DELHI, India-Countries in Asia and Southeast Asia specifically hit by economic crisis in the late 1990s are on the recovery path, paving the way for exponential growth in the wireless industry in the next two years. Early signs of this fast-track growth are...
WASHINGTON-Baltimore superlawyer Peter Angelos is teaming with George Carlo, who headed the U.S. industry-funded mobile phone-cancer research program before breaking with the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA) last year, to create a new radiation-protection project that will include follow-up studies and establish a comprehensive...
SEOUL, South Korea-Korean mobile telecom carriers are looking to stake out the biggest share in the fast-growing wireless Internet and data market, shifting from a voice-oriented strategy.The explosion of the Internet and mobile-phone use is driving the convergence of the two high-tech media, offering...
MANILA, The Philippines-Globe Telecom, the second-largest cellular telephone operator in the Philippines, announced a US$2.3 billion merger with another Philippine wireless service provider, Isla Communications. The agreement allows Ayala Corp., Singapore Telecom and Deutsche Telekom to partner on the island nation.Globe Telecom is a...
British Telecom and AT&T said they are beginning trials to test roaming services for high-speed Internet phones. The tests will involve General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) technology and partnerships with wireless operators SmarTone of Hong Kong and Taiwan's FarEasTone. The trials will begin in...
ItalyNEC and Telecom Italia Mobile said they have agreed to work together in technical trials in March for Universal Mobile Telecommunications Systems. Siemens also will cooperate in the trial. NEC will provide infrastructure and handsets. A series of further trials will be based around...
TEL AVIV, Israel-In a country like Israel where the number of mobile phone lines surpasses fixed lines (2.9 million compared with 2.8 million), where there's intense competition among the three carriers and churn is high (sometimes 60 percent), and where price is less and...
Things are going well for most mobile companies around the globe. Penetration rates are increasing, subscriber numbers are reaching all-time highs and wireless data holds future promise for the industry. The last year has been especially profitable for wireless handset manufacturers.Nokia reported its strongest...
DENVER, United States-While Vodafone AirTouch recently advanced its merger with Germany's Mannesmann AG, the company indicated it may look to fill in its footprint with some smaller acquisitions.In particular, the company has been closing in on a bid for a stake in Spain's second-largest...
IBM and AT&T announced an alliance to offer wireless data services to their business customers. Financial terms of the partnership were not disclosed. The companies said they expected significant opportunities for wireless services linking corporate information systems with a wide range of portable computer...
International roaming is a key selling point for all three digital cellular standards. The GSM community in particular often claims that roaming capability is not only a prime factor in the widespread acceptance of GSM but also a reason for its introduction in the...
SINGAPORE-Singapore has fast-forwarded its liberalization plans for the telecommunications sector by a staggering two years, effectively throwing the industry wide open almost immediately.The move, which comes into effect on 1 April this year, is the island state's boldest move in the communications arena thus...
MONTREAL-The transmission was delayed 20 minutes because the test PC had crashed. And the picture quality, to put it kindly, was choppy. Nevertheless, in February, Rogers AT&T Wireless and Ericsson Canada made the first wireless phone call in North America to be carried over...
HandsetsPhilipsPhilips introduced several new handsets. The Ozeo GSM dual-band mobile phone offers a new user interface and a large LCD display with five text lines. The carousel icon screen feature simultaneously displays up to five visual icons representing the phone's functions and features. The...
Much has been made of the battle for supremacy of the operating system for the wireless data terminal market. With the number of Internet-enabled wireless devices expected to outnumber PC Internet connections within a few years, people are asking, "What is going to be...
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) expects to hold an auction for the remaining narrowband PCS licenses as early as mid-2000. In preparation for the auction, the FCC plans to issue auction rules during first-quarter 2000. The FCC released proposed rules on what should be...
CANNES, France and HANNOVER, Germany-Visitors at the ever-expanding GSM World Congress, held in February in Cannes, France, could have mistaken the huge exhibition as focusing exclusively on Wireless Application Protocol (WAP). For the second year running, it appeared almost every exhibitor had a WAP...
WASHINGTON-Baltimore superlawyer Peter Angelos is teaming with George Carlo, who headed the industry-funded mobile phone cancer research program before breaking with the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association last year, to create a new radiation-protection project that will include follow-up studies and establish a comprehensive surveillance...
L.M. Ericsson introduced a mobile Internet portal solution developed for wireless networks called the Ericsson WISE Portal. WISE was designed as a single point of access for various Internet-enabled devices, including personal computers, browser-enabled mobile phones and connected personal digital assistants. It supports both...
Leveraging its strength as a leading management and consulting firm to most of the top companies in the world, Andersen Consulting has unveiled a new wireless portal designed for the businesses it serves.The company is introducing what it calls the Mobile Corporate Portal, and...
MELBOURNE, Australia-In a part of the world that still relies on word of mouth as a means to keep in touch, cellular communications-both digital and analog-is continuing to spread through the Pacific Islands as greater numbers of people in the region adjust to using...
