SAN DIEGO-Qualcomm Inc. said it amended Sharp's existing CDMA subscriber unit license agreement, expanding the licenses to include the development, manufacture and sale of subscriber equipment for third-generation CDMA and High Data Rate products.Prior to the amendment, Sharp's CDMA license covered only cdmaOne applications....
BUCHAREST, Romania-As of 1 March, 2001, Telenor will close down its NMT 900 analog mobile network. Norwegian authorities agree with Telenor the digital GSM system is a fully acceptable alternative to the NMT 900 system and have shortened the license period, which will now...
The downward trend that has been under way in the messaging industry since 1998 is unfortunately continuing in most markets around the world. The good news is that subscriber numbers are decreasing at a slower rate than in 1999. In some countries, the number...
LONDON-Wireless Internet-capable devices are set for explosive growth in unit shipments as the price/performance equation shifts over the next five years to accommodate the growing information, communication and entertainment needs of wireless users, according to a report from Strategy Analytics.The report, "Wireless Devices for...
In this age of politics of destruction, it does my heart good to see Republicans and Democrats-from the far right to the far left-unite against a common foe: Big Brother. Yep, Big Brother is the Great Unifier.So it was last Monday when the House Judiciary...
HONG KONG-The board of directors of Cable & Wireless HKT Ltd. unanimously resolved to recommend to C&W HKT's shareholders that they accept the offer from Pacific Century CyberWorks Ltd. to acquire the entire issued share capital of the Hong Kong wireless carrier.The takeover was...
NEW YORK-SkyBridge L.P. is building a network and a business model designed to sidestep the negatives associated with other land and space alternatives for local loop broadband communications delivery.The Bethesda, Md., company expects to launch commercial service covering temperate latitudes sometime during 2003, at...
WASHINGTON-With the House up for grabs this fall and a slew of high-tech bills pending before Congress, the high-tech lobby is flexing its muscle on Capitol Hill and shaping the debate on key issues important to the wireless industry such as China trade, high-tech...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission is expected shortly to rule on Motorola Inc.'s 911 call processing-telematics waiver request, a filing that attracted industry support and sharp criticism from consumer and public-safety groups.Motorola last month asked the FCC for permission to build an additional 30,000 handsets...
NEW YORK-Last May, 25 technology companies established the ASP Industry Consortium, Wakefield, Mass., to accomplish a delicate but important mission. Bring some order to the burgeoning and somewhat chaotic application service provider sector, but avoid actual standards setting.By definition, ASPs house, host and manage...
NEW ORLEANS-Lucent Technologies Inc. has been relatively quiet about its plans for the wireless Internet, but last week it announced a number of initiatives to propel itself into this arena. Lucent, Sun Microsystems and iPlanet E-Commerce Solutions, a Sun-Netscape Alliance, released an end-to-end solution...
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...
CANNES, France-Several well-known firms in the Internet and wireless industries have come together to form the Mobile Wireless Internet Forum with the intent to accelerate the deployment of open, Internet-based standards for mobile wireless devices.The group said it hopes to provide a venue for...
OXFORD, United Kingdom-The principal supporters of the Bluetooth short-range wireless technology used the U.S.-based Comdex exhibition late last year to take the message of its capabilities to a much wider and more diverse audience. But despite this first public display of the technology, many...
"I now felt for the first time absolutely certain that the day would come when mankind would be able to send messages `round the wires, not only across the Atlantic, but between the furthermost ends of the earth."Guglielmo Marconi could certainly justify his statement...
WASHINGTON-The Federal Communications Commission is advocating legislation for spectrum fees, tax certificates and "two-sided" auctions as part of its new spectrum policy, a tack that drew a sharp rebuke last week from FCC member Harold Furchtgott-Roth."Speculation and advocacy is inappropriate in this statement,"...
NEW YORK-Not unexpectedly, the multiservice telecommunications giants led the way in revenues and profits for the first half of this year.Profit leadersBell Atlantic Corp. led in profits for the period, posting $2.315 billion, a 19.5-percent increase from the same period of 1998. It traded...
TORONTO-Canada has vast acreage and is sparsely populated in many areas, yet it has the most affordable wireless rates in the world, according to new research.A recent study by the Yankee Group, a Boston-based technology research firm, concluded that Canada, when measured against 27...
TOKYO-Hitachi Ltd., Intel Corp., Mitsubishi Electric Corp. and Sharp Corp. agreed to standardize specifications for stacked chip scale packages, a multiple memory module for mobile communications and handheld computing applications.Specifications of S-CSP with flash memory and SRAM chips include compatibility of pin assign, unification...
WASHINGTON-Republicans, seeing potentially dividing issues in 2000 and hoping to tap into the deep pockets of Digital America, are fighting Democrats for the heart and soul of the high-tech agenda in the next century.Days after Vice President and Democratic presidential front-runner Al Gore outlined...
NEW YORK-Consumer perception of Korea Telecom as "slow moving and bureaucratic, but quite good at service provision," has helped, not hindered, its subsidiary Korea Telecom Freetel, said Sang-Chul Lee, president and chief executive officer.The Code Division Multiple Access personal communications services provider, which holds...
Asia-Pacific countries are beginning to emerge from the severe economic problems that have gripped them for two years, and mobile phone carriers are finding they desperately need cash to expand services.Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines took the hardest economic hits after the Thai...
TOKYO-Tokyo Telemessages Inc. (TTM), a paging company suffering from huge debts due to a sharp drop in customers because of strong competition from mobile phone operators, went bankrupt at the end of May. The beeper operator has debts of around 25 billion yen (US$206...
BANGALORE, India-Although cellular operators in India fear revenue losses of as much as 25 percent due to a sharp increase in the monthly rental, or service charge, from US$3.90 to US$15, many in the industry hope the new tariff structure will expand cellular usage...
