Everyone's Blog Posts - MOBILE & WIRELESS

Mobility Sales Exec positions for a T riffic company.

2010-04-29T17:54:15.000Z

Locations VA/DC /Dallas TX / Morristown NJ/ Atlanta GA

Base 95-110K 50-60k Commission at 100% of plan.

Primary Job Responsibilities:

To sell mobility application solutions and wireless data products and related services in a defined
territory.
To proactively identify, close and deliver wireless data and application solutions with particular
emphasis in the customer’s lines of business working with sales
teams
and account managers.
Manage the assigned region or territory to drive mobility application solutions and wireless data
products to assigned targets/quotas.
Apply the wireless data line of business sales framework within the context of the region supported
and ensure this framework is executed by the front line Account
Execute.
Proactively utilize in depth technical and sales expertise while leveraging the value proposition,
case studies, work flow and ROI tools to drive wireless application
sales and mobilizing customers business processes.
In collaboration with assigned Sales Teams (Director, Sales Manager and Account Managers) develop plans
to optimize wireless data sales in territory by proactively
prioritizing
targeted accounts and or solutions.
Position self as the wireless data solutions and mobility applications Subject Matter Expert (SME)
in territory.
Proactively participate in wireless data and mobility application account and opportunity reviews
with Sales management
Provides responsive, timely and thorough responses to customers and sales people supported.
Drive knowledge transfer to the sellers and customers on new wireless data solutions as needed.
Employ advanced and consultative selling techniques and leverage technical and solutioning knowledge to solution customer business problems in order to achieve wireless
data revenue and AT&T Mobile application sales targets.
Build alliances, both internal and external with the mobility partner ecosystem and execute programs
across functional organizations to successfully implement wireless
data
and application solutions.
Develop, document and share best practices for selling wireless data and application solutions.
Serve as the data and application lead on responses to RFX’s and unsolicited proposals.
Stay current and maintain a comprehensive knowledge of complex data products and AT&T Mobility
Applications solutions and pricing.
Demonstrate an understanding of key business and profit drivers for customers and identify solutions
which complement their business objectives and mobilize their
business.
Utilize sales automation tools as appropriate.
Provide timely and accurate account status reports, forecasts, opportunity funnel and business plans
to sales leadership and operational teams as required.

Preferred Candidate Qualifications:

Bachelor’s Degree in a technical field preferred.
5-7 years experience with demonstrated success in selling technology, applications and solutions
sales
Experience with Oracle, Siebel and/or SAP sales highly desired
Enterprise Application Sales experience preferred
Excellent verbal, written, presentation and interpersonal skills.
Proven ability to transfer knowledge to others.
Well organized with attention to detail.
Passion for winning.
Ability to comfortably interact with senior leadership, customer executives and frontline employees.
Presents professional image of self and Company.
Strong technical knowledge in the following areas: Mobility Applications, Mobility Platforms and
Operating Systems, VPN, WLAN, WWAN, LAN, TCP/IP, Routers, IP SEC,
CDMA,
GSM, GPRS, EDGE, UMTS, HSPA, LTE, 802.11, Application
Demonstrated ability to quickly learn a technical product or service.
History of success in consultative/applications selling to large accounts.
Proven quota achievement acting in a solution sales and or sales support role.
Ability to adapt to a rapidly changing industry and work environment.
Versatile relationship skills in order to maintain strong bonds with people from a variety of backgrounds
including technical, legal, marketing, product development, project
management and sales.
Excellent organizational skills which provide the ability to manage multiple projects simultaneously.

Please email resumes and contact info to cassandra@roznosinc.com

Data Access Engineers

2010-04-23T09:29:51.000Z

My Client based in Berkshire in the UK is currently recruiting for a Data Access Platform and System Designer to join them on a contract basis. You will be responsible for designing and documenting capacity upgrades/new functionality for the Data Access Networks. You will be the Technical Design Authority for the design, development and integration of the solutions and will manage the delivery of your assigned projects with the other functional areas within Data Access Networks.

Key technical skills:

- TCP/IP
- Radius
- Fixed or Mobile Data networks, especially data billing
- Solid understanding of applications and how they interact with the network stack

If you are interested in this role, then please call 0044 1189565533 or c.brown@huxley.co.uk.

Thanks.

Chris.

Gearing Up for the Backhaul Challenge: Sprint, Cricket, CFN and Fierce Wireless Report

2010-03-31T18:56:24.000Z

Download Now

By now there’s no doubt about it: mobile operators need to get their backhaul networks in condition to meet the burgeoning market for anytime, anywhere data access. Backhaul, once considered the humdrum side of an operator’s network, has become the topic du jour now that the mobile phone customershave shifted to smartphones and are taking advantage of data-hungry services in a big way. Earlier this month, AT&T reported that its wireless data traffic has grown more than 5,000 percent over the past three years, largely due to smartphones, which are used by about 40 percent of its post-paid customer base. All operators have to contend with this growth, and quickly: smartphones should represent the vast majority (65%) of phones sold in the country by 2012, according to Creative Strategies, an analyst firm. Operators are taking steps to prepare their networks to meet the expected demand, and the process of identifying specific backhaul needs and configuring the best solutions will force companies to bring the backhaul problem to the forefront of their infrastructure and business planning. This is a closer look at the available options and considerations operators must keep in mind as they prepare to build out this part of their networks.

job opening

2010-02-05T10:50:54.000Z

product based comapny looking for people strong in wireless software area having knowledge in networking.
location- bangalore
experience-2 to 12 years
salary will not be an issue.
interested candidates please contact me niladri@pylonmc.com
or call me at 9945417000

CTIA rev. 3.0 will be effective in 2010

2009-11-02T10:01:50.000Z

CTIA has released its final version of the CTIA V3.0 on May 5th, 2009.

CTIA 2.2.2 will remain active for PTCRB certification until all the OTA CATLs
are accredited for V3.0 specification.

The major changes in the new version of CTIA V3.0 are the new test
requirements such as AGPS TIS Test, 3G Notebook Test, Receiver Diversity
Test for WCDMA and CDMA2000 1xRTT/EV DO, and hand phantom test.
In addition to CTIA V2.2.2 requirements of Free Space and Head Phantom
(left and right sides) test modes for mobile phone devices, CTIA V3.0
advanced the test requirements with Right Head + Right Hand and
Right-Hand-Only test modes.

Notebooks or devices without voice function by holding up to head will only
need to apply for Free Space test mode.

AGPS TIS test mode for mobile phones will be Right Head + Right Hand and
Right-Hand-only mode in both UE-assisted and UE-based configurations.

Sporton has the capability to carry out CTIA V3.0 pretests now and official
tests can be launched as soon as we are accredited by CTIA.

Contact with Kelly at kellyhuang@sporton.com.tw for more info.

Thanks
Kelly

The Thing called Social Media for Operators

2009-07-17T07:34:43.000Z

Most telco CxOs nowadays will have a fair understanding of what social media is and how it has pervaded the industry and its consumers (and even enterprise clients).

Wikipedia defines it as ..." Social media is online content created by people using highly accessible and scalable publishing technologies. At its most basic sense, social media is a shift in how people discover, read and share news, information and content. It's a fusion of sociology and technology, transforming monologues (one to many) into dialogues (many to many) and is the democratization of information, transforming people from content readers into publishers. Social media has become extremely popular because it allows people to connect in the online world to form relationships for personal, political and business use. Businesses also refer to social media as user-generated content (UGC) or consumer-generated media (CGM)."

Not a lot of emerging market telco CxOs though understand how it works and appreciate the power it can wield for them if leveraged well. There are a few operators in SEA region which are progressive enough to have started some shapes and forms of social media in engaging their customers. But exemplary success apart from what has been seen with CyWorld, which was bought by SK Telecom later, has been rare.

Over the years, the likes of Singtel with its Moblog (www.moblog.com.sg)and Maxis with its MBlog (www.mblog.com.my)were among the first in the region to venture into mobile social networking. However, from the looks of how they have managed and supported these communities, it seemed like they are completely amiss on its potential and how it could have given them enough equity among netizen subscribers in the last 4-5 years since they introduced these mobile social networking communities.

It's sad that Singtel and Maxis have wasted years of potential lead in this space in that they have simply allowed their communities of subscribers to wilt away. Singtel has recently announced in its MoBlog site that it is closing down the service on July 22. MBlog continues to be the same boring site to date when i start profiling the site some 3 years back.

These operator-led mobile social networks used to be the shining examples of progressiveness in the social media space or what some call as user generated content (UGC) space. Funny that while every other operator in the region are scrambling for resources and expertise on how to launch their own social media sites, these 2 operators seem to be abandoning what they pioneered, years ahead of their competition.

I know of operators in the regions right now which are seriously studying or even close to launching their own social media efforts. In Thailand, I know of an operator who recently launched their own UGC trading community about a year back. Though the community has not prospered yet, I do believe that with proper focus on execution and alignment to the overall business strategy and the support it requires to build the community, it should be on its way of getting a critical mass of participants.

Telcos have to understand that a foray into the social media will not give short term ROI like any tactical marketing program. Building communities don't happen overnight. Stars like Facebook and Linkedin did not become popular overnight. It takes years to build the community, but if you succeed, you don't need much of an ATL budget to spend. You will have millions of ambassadors doing the marketing for you.

So how can operators leverage the social media trend?

Operators need to understand that the consumer should be at the center of things in providing social media environment. In social media, content is from consumers not from operators. Consumers are the new creators, opinion makers, networkers, and distributors of this new space.

Hence, operators cannot rely anymore from their own marketing messages and product brochures to keep the community members engaged. They have to depend on activist community members and early adopters to market the community and encourage content contribution from other members.

What this means is that the community has to be open.

1) Open means no restrictions on how to join or log in
2) Open means providing various access like mobile internet, mobile SMS short codes, in addition to fixed internet
3) Open means being able to create, upload, share and trade any content from any terminal PC or mobile
4) Open means anyone can join and access the communities, not only my subscribers but also other operators' subscribers.

Walled garden and restricted access approaches that place limitations on consumers will no longer work if you want your social media community to prosper.

At the heart of all social media efforts, operators will need a separate social media strategy to be able to fully leverage the power of the communities it can bring in.

This strategy has to take into account these five (5) important social media ideas.

1) Offer environments for consumers to create, store, and manage their digital identities at various levels ensuring wherever the consumers go, they still rely and route through the environment.
2) Revise marketing strategy to leverage ‘Viral Marketing’ and ‘Tryvertising’
3) Harness social networking by building own networks around localized motivations and embedding these into larger global social networks (e.g. Facebook, MySpace etc.)
4) Enable user generated content (UGC) via tools and platforms with rewarding mechanisms to drive quality to ward off reliance on content provision agencies.
5) Revise portal strategy – ‘Me’ portal that enables consumers to project outwards embedded onto ‘My’ portal that assimilates what the consumer is interested in.

Operators need to play the social media game today to ensure they are still in business tomorrow. The social media technologies are readily available and easily implementable. The issues are not implementation but conceptualization.

The revenue potential of social media will depend on the monetization model based on :
1) Scale of consumer traffic
2) Level of (potential) addictiveness (to service)
3) Offerings on personalization, UGC, social network and other add on services for utilities and entertainment purpose.

The speed of realization will depend on :
1) Level of mobile, internet, and Web 2.0 familiarity (such as usage of blog, social network, media sharing)
2) Identification of a strong early adopter group that can help hasten take up

Putting the consumers at the center however, may put the operator on the periphery. Why not? Part of leveraging the social media trend is letting go. Specifically with respect to communities, operators will need to contend with :

1) Lack of control over the evolution of networks and applications that communities initiate
2) Users who will wield more influence over communities, individuals, and transactions than operators can
3) Outside applications that will find their way in via consumers

Operators will also need to develop an understanding of local context outside their business – communities and activities will be centered around interests, needs, and affiliations, not the operator. Most importantly, operators will need to be agile and aware enough to follow trends in the community to revise their offering and possibly brand positioning.

You can download a whitepaper around this topic co-written by this author with Chintan Rastogi at www.redpillsolutions.com.

The cell phone is 36 years old

2009-07-16T23:39:34.000Z

Yesterday marked the 36th anniversary of the first public telephone call placed on a portable cellular phone. Martin Cooper, ArrayComm's chairman, CEO and co-founder, placed that call on April 3, 1973, while general manager of Motorola's Communications Systems Division. It was the incarnation of his vision for personal wireless communications, distinct from cellular car phones. That first call, placed to Cooper's rival at AT&T's Bell Labs from the streets of New York City, caused a fundamental technology and communications market shift toward the person and away from the place

"People want to talk to other people -- not a house, or an office, or a car. Given a choice, people will demand the freedom to communicate wherever they are, unfettered by the infamous copper wire. It is that freedom we sought to vividly demonstrate in 1973," said Cooper.
He added, "As I walked down the street while talking on the phone, sophisticated New Yorkers gaped at the sight of someone actually moving around while making a phone call. Remember that in 1973, there weren't cordless telephones, let alone cellular phones. I made numerous calls, including one where I crossed the street while talking to a New York radio reporter -- probably one of the more dangerous things I have ever done in my life."
Following the April 3, 1973, public demonstration, using a "brick"-like 30-ounce phone, Cooper started the 10-year process of bringing the portable cell phone to market. Motorola introduced the 16-ounce "DynaTAC" phone into commercial service in 1983, with each phone costing the consumer US$3,500. It took seven additional years before there were a million subscribers in the United States. Today, there are more cellular subscribers than wireline phone subscribers in the world, with mobile phones weighing as little as 3 ounces.

Cooper's role in conceiving and developing the first portable cellular phone directly impacted his choice to found and lead ArrayComm, a wireless technology and systems company founded in 1992. ArrayComm's core adaptive antenna technology increases the capacity and coverage of any cellular system, while significantly lowering costs and making speech more reliable. This technology addresses what Cooper calls "the unfulfilled promise" of cellular, which should be, but still isn't as reliable or affordable as wired telephony.

ArrayComm has also used its adaptive antenna technology to make the Internet "personal" by creating the i-BURST Personal Broadband System, which delivers high-speed, mobile Internet access that consumers can afford.

"It's very exciting to be part of a movement toward making broadband available to people with the same freedom to be anywhere that they have for voice communications today," said Cooper. "People rely heavily on the Internet for their work, entertainment and communication, but they need to be unleashed. We will look back at 2003 as the beginning of the era when the Internet became truly untethered."

The Advantages of GSM

2009-07-16T23:10:22.000Z

What is GSM?

Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) is by far the most widely used wireless technology in the world today. GSM is a second-generation (2G) wireless technology that provides high-quality voice and circuit-switched data services in a wide variety of spectrum bands, including 450, 800, 850, 900, 1800 and 1900 MHz. GSM pioneered many of the world's most popular data services, such as Short Message Service (SMS) and Multimedia Message Service (MMS).

GSM is a digital or “PCS” technology. The phrase “GSM family of technologies” is often used as a catch-all term to refer to GPRS, EDGE and UMTS/HSPA, which provide a smooth, cost-effective evolution to third generation (3G). GSM is the most widely used wireless technology in the Americas and worldwide, with more than 86% of the global wireless market. As of 3Q 2007, more than 2.7 billion people worldwide -- approximately 41% of the world's population -- use GSM.

GSM allows multiple users to share a single radio channel through a technique called time division multiplexing (TDM), where a channel is divided into six time slots. Each caller is assigned a specific time slot for transmission, which allows multiple callers to share a single channel simultaneously without interfering with one another. This design makes efficient use of spectrum and provides seven times more capacity than analog or “AMPS”, which is a first-generation (1G) technology. GSM also uses a technique called “frequency hopping,” which minimizes interference from outside sources and makes eavesdropping virtually impossible.

What are the advantages of GSM?

GSM's advantages can be divided into two main categories: user benefits and operator benefits.

Key user benefits include:

* Clear voice quality, which helps make GSM a viable alternative to wireline telephony for consumers and businesses. Although data is an increasingly popular wireless application, voice continues to be the primary reason why people use wireless technology.

* International roaming, with service available in more than 220 countries as of 3Q 2007, the widest footprint of any mobile wireless technology. As a result, users enjoy the convenience of being reachable with their GSM device and phone number when traveling in these countries and territories, as well as the ability to access messaging and other advanced services that they use in their home market. Partnerships within the GSM community help to keep users' roaming charges affordable, and allow for any roaming charges to be automatically billed to their accounts back in their home market.

* Spectral flexibility, with user devices available for the 450, 850, 900, 1800 and 1900 MHz bands, the widest variety of any wireless technology. Tri- and quad-band GSM phones are common, reducing the chances that users will ever travel to an area without at least one GSM network to which they can connect.

* Tight security, including inherent protection from eavesdropping and hacking. This helps make GSM voice and data an attractive alternative to analog cellular and Wi-Fi in the eyes of users, particularly enterprises.

* Data support, including SMS, Web browsing and circuit-switched data.

* Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) cards, which allow customers to buy a new or additional phone, or a GSM PC Card modem, and instantly transfer their settings, preferences and contacts to the other device.

* Product selection. GSM's 86% worldwide market share makes it an attractive choice for manufacturers of handsets and for application developers. As a result, GSM customers enjoy the largest selection of handsets, PC card modems and other devices, as well as innovative voice and data services. GSM's market share also translates into large volumes of network infrastructure and user devices, which drive down costs.

* Research and development is heavily supported for the entire GSM family of technologies due to the scope and scale of two billion customers worldwide.

Key operator benefits include:

* Economies of scale: GSM is the most widely used wireless technology in the Americas and worldwide. It is available in more than 220 countries and territories worldwide, as of 3Q 2007, according to the GSM Association. More than 2.7 billion people worldwide, approximately 41% of the world's population, use GSM. As of 3Q 2007, GSM has captured more than 86% of the global wireless market. This market size requires high volumes of handsets and infrastructure, which attract vendors and application developers while reducing costs. With this lower overhead, GSM operators are better able to price their services competitively yet profitably.

* Spectral flexibility, with network infrastructure available for the 450, 850, 900, 1800 and 1900 MHz bands. This is the widest variety of any wireless technology. As a result, operators have more deployment options. For example, an operator that wants to cover a sparsely populated rural area might choose 450 MHz GSM infrastructure because signals travel farther at lower frequencies, so fewer base stations are needed. Those savings can be passed on to customers and investors.

* Spectral efficiency, up to seven times more capacity than analog/AMPS. GSM operators also can upgrade to EDGE, which allows the use of advance voice-coding technologies that can triple voice capacity in the same amount of spectrum.

* International roaming, with service available in more than 220 countries, as of 3Q 2007. That's the most of any wireless technology by a wide margin. Roaming is particularly important for operators for two reasons. First, inbound roaming can contribute a substantial portion of a GSM operator's total revenue, especially for rural and regional operators. Second, roaming support helps operators attract business users, who want to be accessible with their current mobile device and phone number while traveling throughout the Americas and the rest of the world.

* Device selection, including handsets, modems and telemetry products. GSM's 86% global market share drives large device volumes, which translate into a wide selection at a variety of features and prices. Affordability is one of the reasons why GSM is a popular choice for providing voice and data services in developing countries and underserved markets.

* Tight standardization, which helps ensure interoperability between infrastructure and devices from multiple manufacturers. That provides operators with multiple equipment selection options.

* Future-proof evolutionary path: GSM is the first step in a smooth, flexible, cost-effective migration to 3G. Each subsequent step leverages the previous step, and provides backward compatibility, ensuring that investments and customers are maintained during the migration. The standards behind GSM's upgradeability and interoperability are coordinated and supported by key international organizations such as the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). The evolutionary steps to 3G after GSM and GPRS include EDGE, UMTS and HSPA.

Where is GSM available?

A better question might be “Where is GSM not available?”. GSM services are available in more than 220 countries, as of 3Q 2007.

What is the history of GSM?

In 1982, a consortium of European countries created the Group Spéciale Mobile (GSM) to develop a cellular technology that would provide seamless international roaming and support for advanced services not available on analog networks. The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) took over the project in 1989 and finalized the first set of technical specifications.

The first GSM network was launched in 1991, followed by several more the following year. As countries outside Europe adopted the technology, it became clear that GSM would be a global rather than European technology, so the GSM acronym was changed to stand for “Global System for Mobile communications”.

Why have some TDMA operators transitioned to GSM?

The primary reason why TDMA operators have migrated to GSM is for the evolution to 3G offered by the GSM family of technologies. However, there are also many benefits in choosing GSM as a 2G technology.

By transitioning to GSM, TDMA operators and their customers enjoy access to worldwide roaming – more than 220 countries, as of 3Q 2007 – and a much larger selection of infrastructure and handsets. GSM also provides TDMA operators with a smooth, cost-effective migration path to third generation (3G).

GSM's roaming capabilities and global footprint are particularly attractive to TDMA operators because worldwide roaming revenue is a significant and growing revenue source. In 2006, there were 303 million roamers worldwide, and they drove 15% of all wireless revenue. By 2011, the number of roamers is expected to hit 566 million and drive 28% of revenue. By migrating to GSM, TDMA operators can capitalize on this opportunity.

Over the past several years, more than 50 TDMA operators across the Americas have migrated to GSM. Examples in North America include Cingular Wireless/AT&T Wireless (U.S.) and Rogers Wireless (Canada), and in the Caribbean, Cable & Wireless. Many operators throughout Latin America have made the TDMA to GSM migration. Examples include most of the America Móvil properties, such as Telcel in Mexico, and many of the Telefonica properties, such as Movistar.

TDMA-to-GSM migrations are one of the reasons why GSM is the fastest-growing wireless technology in the Americas, increasing from 6% of the regional market in 2000 to more than 63% by year end 2007, according to Informa Telecoms & Media, an independent analyst firm. By the end of 2010, GSM will comprise 75% of subscriptions in the Western Hemisphere.

Why have some CDMA operators transitioned to GSM?

By transitioning to GSM, CDMA operators and their customers enjoy access to international roaming in more than 220 countries, as of 3Q 2007. That's significantly more than CDMA2000 1X, which was available in 69 countries in 3Q 2007.

GSM's roaming capabilities and global footprint are particularly attractive to CDMA operators because worldwide roaming revenue is a significant and growing revenue source. In 2006, there were 303 million roamers worldwide. By 2011, the number of roamers is expected to hit 566 million. By migrating to GSM, CDMA operators are better positioned to capitalize on this opportunity.

Another benefit is a larger selection of infrastructure and user devices. This selection is a byproduct of GSM's global market share: 86% of the worldwide wireless market, as of 3Q 2007, according to the GSM Association. This market size requires high volumes of handsets and infrastructure, which attract vendors and application developers while reducing costs. With GSM's lower overhead, former CDMA operators are better able to price their services competitively yet profitably.

Since 2003, 12 CDMA operators across the Americas have migrated to GSM, committed to this migration or have deployed new GSM networks alongside their existing CDMA networks. In Latin America, examples include America Móvil (Argentina and Mexico) and Vivo (Brazil). In fact, GSM has quickly become the dominant wireless technology across the Americas, and is the top choice of Latin American operators. Market share of CDMA has declined in Latin America and the Caribbean from 21% as of 3Q 2006 to 16% in 3Q 2007 as many operators and their customers are choosing GSM technologies.

CDMA-to-GSM migrations are one of the reasons why GSM is the fastest-growing wireless technology in the Americas, increasing from 6% of the market in the Western Hemisphere in 2000 to more than 62% by 3Q 2007.

How are GSM operators migrating to 3G?

GSM provides the foundation for 3G services and is part of a family of technologies that includes GPRS, EDGE and UMTS/HSPA. Each migration step leverages the previous step and provides backward compatibility, ensuring that investments and customers are maintained during the migration, which can take several years or more. The standards behind GSM's upgradeability and interoperability are coordinated and supported by key international working groups such as the 3GPP.

The first step in a GSM operator's migration to 3G begins with the deployment of GPRS, an IP-based technology that provides packet data at rates of up to 115 kbps. After GPRS, an operator may choose to deploy EDGE and then UMTS/HSDPA or go directly from GPRS to UMTS/HSDPA, depending on its business plan and market conditions. Whatever the choice, the GSM family of technologies provides a smooth, flexible and cost-effective migration path to 3G.

What is a SIM card?

The Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card is a wafer-thin, thumbnail-size microchip used by all GSM devices, including phones and GSM/GPRS PC card modems. Like a credit card or smart card, the SIM securely stores information about the user's account and subscription services, and it can be used to support services such as wireless e-commerce, or “m-commerce.”

The SIM is removable, allowing customers to switch GSM devices when buying a new phone or adding a PC card – without the hassle of configuring the new device or the loss of personalized subscription services, such as messaging. The SIM card makes it easier for users to change GSM operators and keep the same phone. This flexibility makes GSM-based data networks, such as GPRS and UMTS/HSDPA, attractive for a wide variety of data applications.

What companies manufacture GSM handsets and network infrastructure?

Hundreds of models of GSM phones, PDAs and GSM/GPRS modems are currently available from major manufacturers, including HP, Motorola, Nokia, Siemens, Sony Ericsson, and Research In Motion (Blackberry). GSM devices are available in a wide variety of price points and feature sets, including high-end models with color screens and built-in digital cameras. Additionally, because GSM is an open standard, any vendor can manufacture GSM equipment. This freedom is one of the reasons why GSM operators and customers enjoy such a broad selection of equipment and vendors.

GSM network infrastructure is available from dozens of vendors, including Alcatel, Ericsson, Nokia Siemens, Nortel Networks and Motorola.

How Long Can the Wireless Recession Last?

2009-07-16T23:07:58.000Z

Network operators - among them British Telecom, France Telecom, and Deutsche Telekom - have spent tens of billions of dollars on 3G licenses. To do so, they have shouldered unsupportable debt. As a consequence, their credit ratings have crashed from among the highest in Europe to just above "junk" status. To relieve these debt burdens, they are now issuing bonds at exceptionally high interest rates and are selling shares and assets at distressed levels.

Deutsche Telekom's preliminary report, published in January 2001, suggested that, excluding capital gains from the sales of assets, it might possibly have lost as much as 3.5 billion euros ($3.3 billion) during 2000. This would be a dramatic reversal from 1999, during which it reported a net income of 2.3 billion euros ($2.2 billion). Of its possible loss, 850 million euros would have stemmed from writing down 400 million euros in good will and from paying 450 million euros in amortization and interest on debt for its 3G mobile phone licenses. Telekom, however, stated that "there was no operating loss." Also in January, British Telecom announced the possibilities of a dividend cut as well as a partial sale of Airtel Movil, the Spanish mobile operator in which it owns a 17.8 percent stake. With this, industry analysts and the trade press savaged the company, citing its "desperate debt situation" and a "European vision ... in tatters." In March, France Telecom issued $15 billion in bonds - the largest single corporate bond issue in world history - to refinance the short-term borrowings it had used to support its acquisition sprees and 3G licenses.

Even operators who are not acquiring other operators or licenses are challenged to raise the funds they need to construct their networks. Sprint PCS, engaged in the ferociously competitive U.S. market (up to six operators in major markets) hopes to raise as much as five billion dollars during 2001 solely for infrastructure spending. This, however, would likely lead to dilution of its shares or a downgrading of its credit rating, or both.

In light of the above, many, albeit not all, wireless operators (as well as landline operators), have drastically cut their investments in new infrastructure. This has sent the infrastructure vendors reeling.

Lucent's position is in tatters. After pushing for 20 percent annual growth in 2001, it now acknowledges that sales will fall five billion dollars, or close to 20 percent, below its initial sales target of $25.5 billion. Lucent's struggles to maintain the illusion of growth have been disastrous. It stands accused of accounting irregularities severe enough to warrant an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (with which Lucent is fully cooperating). Shareholders have pummeled it with legal suits alleging fraud. Its former CEO Richard McGinn has been fired. Ms. Nina Aversano, its North American sales chief, has resigned and is now suing Lucent under New Jersey's whistle-blower statute. At the end of its December 2000 quarter, its revenue decreased by 36 percent from a year earlier. To staunch the flow of red ink, it announced that it would reduce its "net headcount by approximately 10,000 employees."

Among the infrastructure vendors, Motorola is likely most tied to the wireless market. In April 2000, it announced that both second-quarter and annual earnings would be lower than earlier expected. In September 2000, it reduced its earnings expectations further. Between December 2000 and February 2001, it announced 9,000 job cuts. On March 12, it announced a further 7,000 job cuts.

Nortel Networks, which we rank as the most astute and strategically best placed of the major infrastructure vendors, sounded an earnings alarm only in January. While Nortel reported meeting expectations for its fourth-quarter earnings, it cautioned that "capital within the telecom sector" was "tightening" and that its revenue and operating earnings per share during 2001 would increase about 30 percent, at the lower end of its earlier forecast range. Little more than a month later, Nortel cited a "severe economic downturn" and concomitant cutback in infrastructure spending by network operators and what it expected would be sharply reduced revenues and earnings for the year. Concurrently, it announced a planned reduction in staff of 10,000. Six weeks later, Nortel again lowered its expected first-quarter revenues and increased its expectations of operating loss. John Roth, President and CEO, cited "reduced and/or deferred capital spending and increased pricing pressure ... resulting in lower overall revenues." The company announced a further reduction in force of 5,000 workers. Ominously, Roth stated that, "Given the ... breadth of the economic downturn and its impact on the overall market growth in 2001, it is not possible to provide meaningful guidance for the Company's financial performance for the full year 2001."

We cannot comment on the prognosis for the entire telecommunications industry. However, in terms of wireless, a dispassionate analysis of the market uncovers a more positive picture for both operators and their infrastructure vendors. This stems from two factors. First is the continuing growth in wireless subscribers and minutes (and packets) of network use. Second are the more robust networks required to deliver 3G or 3G-like services.

It is almost certain that subscriber growth peaked during 2000. During that year, the number of subscribers worldwide increased by 231,000,000 or 38.5 percent, rising from 478,000,000 at year-end 1999 to 709,000,000. This was 61,000,000 greater than the 170,000,000-subscriber increase during 1999.

European countries are now surpassing 70 percent penetration. At such levels, it is impossible for them to continue their previous rates of growth. In most other regions of the world, the subscriber bases are too small and/or the population too poor to compensate for the slow-down in European growth. This, together with recession in the U.S., suggests that subscriber growth during 2001 will range from 170,000,000 to 200,000,000. This would be 31,000,000 to 61,000,000 less than the growth of 2000.

That points to a slow-down in infrastructure sales. However, even subscriber growth of 170,000,000 would represent a 24 percent increase over the approximately 709,000,000 subscribers at year-end 2000. The increase in network traffic may be less than this, or, driven by greater usage by established subscribers, it may be more. Regardless, the increase in traffic will be sufficient to compel network operators to deploy more infrastructure to serve it. We anticipate that this will take place between September and December of 2001, if not sooner. Given the accumulating "pent-up demand," the surge in sales of wireless infrastructure at that time may be as dramatic as was the drop in sales during the fourth-quarter of 2000 and the first-quarter of 2001. This may have little to do with 3G, but more with continued investment in today's 2G and 2.5G networks.

Not to be forgotten is the drive of network operators to provide 3G or 3G-like services. For operators with GSM networks, this will take the form of GPRS. For operators with CDMA/IS-95 networks, this will take the form of cdma2000 (or cdma 1X).

In theory, operators may require relatively little infrastructure to deploy such networks. However, the real world of radio frequency transmission varies considerably from theoretical elegance. The transmission of non-voice content is not as forgiving of errors as is the transmission of voice. As a consequence, operators will need networks that transmit at lower bit error rates (BER) than do their conventional voice-centric networks. This will require them to deploy more infrastructure. This may take the form of greater cell density, "smart" antennas, and/or more robust filters.

Notwithstanding the current recession in the wireless industry, two forces will compel network operators to add more infrastructure. On the one hand is the need for greater capacity. This is being driven by continuing growth in subscribers. On the other hand is the need for more robust networks. This is being driven by operator desires to provide 3G and 3G-like services

2001 : A Wireless Oddity

2009-07-16T23:00:13.000Z

Background

2001 was not the brightest year in the history of the telecommunications business. In fact, it was a year of rude awakenings in which the industry was forced to concede that no growth is eternal and that future progress might be significantly more painful.

It was also a period of massive job cuts throughout the business and the point at which the financial community put a padlock on its wallet. Reality checks were applied to every business plan as investors adopted a more cautious approach to 3G projects, operators and wireless start-ups. Having worked across the industry with big and small players during the 2001 turmoil, these are the trends and challenges we see shaping the industry over the next 12 months.

What people predicted on the market

Back in the halcyon days of 1996, when American stock markets were celebrating the 'new economic paradigm", US Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan warned against "irrational exuberance". Nobody listened. Except perhaps Warren Buffet, who muttered something about an antediluvian concept called 'profit' and steered his investment fund clear of 'new economy' stocks. Guess what happened next. Irrational exuberance has been the defining feature of every industry in recent years.

"Nobody wanted to believe trees couldn't grow to the sky," he says T.C.Robillard, wireless equipment analyst at Schroder Salamon Smith Barney. In 2001, gravity reasserted itself with a vengeance: nearly 450,000 jobs lost in telecommunications sector; the largest quarterly loss in corporate history -- $19 billion bled by Nortel in Q2; billions of dollars written off share prices and acquisitions; operator red ink running at 40, 50, even 60 billion dollars; and an unprecedented slowdown in the handset business. It seems something of an understatement when Niklas Savander, VP at Nokia Mobile Software, characterizes 2001 as "a kind of a milestone in that we went from being the untouchable industry to one where normal rules apply."

The financial community has become severe where it was once indulgent. "People realized we can't continue to give credit to a company just because they have a nice little product migration chart. At the end of the day you want to produce something cheaper than you're selling it for," says Robillard. The operators are under the same microscope, according to Stephen Pentland, partner at consultants Spectrum Strategy. "The analysis of valuations is a much closer evaluation than the techniques that were being used a year or 18 months ago. Today's evaluations are being tied more directly to performance ratios. "Unlike the valuations that underpinned the 3G license auctions in Europe last year. "What took place in those bidding rooms typified the hubris of people who were completely untroubled by the possibility that they could be making a dreadful mistake," wrote the Financial Times in September.

Hubris has been transformed to humility. In February, the first dose of reality for the operator community was digested by Orange whose IPO flopped in humiliating fashion (see this month's Mobile Money). Other operators took fright and KPN, BT, Verizon and Deutsche Telekom all postponed plans to expose their mobile units to the equities markets. The collapse in the valuation of the wireless stocks has been a major feature of the year, rounded off in November by NTT DoCoMo's $2.16 billion write-down of its investments in KPN. So why the dramatic loss of confidence? Mauro Sentinelli, CEO of Telecom Italia Mobile, puts his finger on the failure to launch the next generation of mobile services: "The financial community believed we could replicate the success of i-mode. People believed a UMTS license was a license to print money. But because we have been unable to launch a new wireless [data] business cycle, the financial community started to disbelieve. That was the biggest problem all the GSM carriers had last year and this year. We had to prove to the financial community that we were positioned to start a new wireless business cycle."

How could the industry go about proving that? Pentland sums up the priorities for wireless operators. They have to, "demonstrate that they are holding their customer base and not allowing competition to erode ARPU's; show that they are managing the business in a manner that will deliver efficiency improvements and therefore EBITDA improvement; and demonstrate that they are going to get data services launched right this time."

This last requirement has largely proved to be beyond the GSM World, which has been repeatedly spooked by news of equipment delays and postponed launches. The biggest jolt to confidence came in April when NTT DoCoMo announced it would delay of its FOMA 3G service until October. From then on the hedging began in earnest. Vodafone revealed it was scaling back its 3G network build-out and played down the prospects for a return on investment before 2004. Sonera bailed out of 3G in Norway in August, becoming the first licensee to hand back 3G spectrum for nothing. And operator after operator revealed delays to their network built-out. Throughout the year pressure built on national regulators to allow some king of 3G relief, and, in May, both the German and British regulators relented, allowing operators to follow the Swedish example and share network infrastructure. Other countries, including Spain and the Netherlands, also bowed to the inevitable and altered their license terms. This process culminated in the spectacular U-turn in a year of U-turns -- executed by French Government in October, when it retrospectively slashed the prices of UMTS licenses. The upshot is that numerous network-sharing agreements have been signed, perhaps the most significant being that between Deutsche Telekom and mmO2 to collaborate in Germany and the UK. This saves enormous amounts of CAPEX and is at east a step towards that elusive new wireless business cycle.

With regard to the first of Pentland's criteria, some of the most revealing announcements this year came form Vodafone, which was at great pains to demonstrate that its ARPU had 'stabilized' in the third quarter. In April, the company paraded a new accounting system for its subscriber bas that would discount so-called 'inactive' customers. The company argued that "penetration levels could be up to ten percent lower and ARPU correspondingly higher." Coupled with widespread reductions on handsets subsidies for prepaid phones, this was representative of the most significant, and perhaps the most concerted, industry shift of the year. In a November research report, Credit Suisse First Boston indicated that this policy had paid off with margins for the leading operators in Europe in Q2 at "their highest level in five years." Jane Zweig, CEO of consultancy the Shosteck Group, sums up the situation: "You have a world where everyone pushed prepay really hard and now they are trying to get them all back to postpaid because they can't figure out how to upsell them on data services."

According to Steve Melhuish, director of Mobile Carrier Services at Cable&Wireless, operators have also made progress on the second of Pentland's criteria, rationalizing and integrating their internal progress. "We, as a supplier to the industry, have seen a great deal of activity and change in the big shareholder groups in driving some costs and revenue synergies. They are doing a hell of a lot in terms of coordinating their activities and centralizing their decision-making." Michael Davies, chairman of consultancy Mercator, agrees. "They are also moving into more collaborative relationships with their partners so that rather than being a bunch of independent national players with different brands who happen to share ownership, this is the emergence of a global business."

Hence the emphasis placed on global branding in 2001 by the likes of Vodafone, Orange, T-Mobile. As voice services become a commodity, these operators seek to own the customer through emotional identification with their brand and services, although the poor performance of operator-backed portals this year has shown that this will be more difficult than they anticipated. And Davies is none too impressed with some initial attempts to launch data services over GPRS. "Vodafone and BT's launch of GPRS is a travesty. They are positioning it as a form of enhanced WAP. You can't use it for internet browsing. They have completely missed the point and completely failed to deliver."

Greater integration allows the big operators to maximize their bargaining power when it comes to procurement. Vendors know on which side their bread is buttered, and in September Ericsson announced that it would restructure its sales divisions to cater specifically for its largest customers. Nokia also believes that big is beautiful. Arja Suominen, VP at Nokia Networks, confirms that the company since the first half of this year, where we are more customer-focused rather than geographically focused. The significant change in the market is that operators are increasingly global in their reach."

On the other hand, some operators have begun to bypass the traditional vendors and source some devices almost on a bespoke basis with a specific market segment in mind. Next year, mmO2 will supply so popular with corporate America and the Taiwan-manufactured XDA. Orange will offer the HipTop, and a host of other hybrid PDA-phone devices should provide an alternative to traditional handsets. Again this is all about operator touting its exclusive services, devices and brand to capture the loyalty of the end-user. The next five years should feature and intriguing dynamic between operators, vendors and mobile ISPs all seeking to woo the customer.

By 2001 global wireless had grown obese, and manufacturers were the fattest. Handset sales for 2000 had become in under industry expectations and the sector was bloated with surplus inventories of 30 million terminals. Here was the hard evidence of a slowing market, suggesting that developed regions were approaching saturation and that the replacements period for handsets was lengthening. Margins have also shrunk as competition increased. Without Sentinelli's new wireless business cycle, vendors had to find ways to slim down. Job cuts have grabbed all the headlines, but perhaps more significant have been the trends towards outsourcing.

In January, Ericsson announced that it would cease manufacturing its own devices and outsource the bulk of this business to contract manufacturer Flextronics, one of this year big winners. A plethora of outsourcing contracts followed with Motorola, Alcatel and Philips among those either increasing their outsourcing or exiting the manufacturing business altogether. Ericsson retains control of R&D, branding and marketing functions in a business model that consumer electronics manufacturers have employed for years. Hence 'commoditisation' became a buzzword for 2001, and an ongoing debate emerged between those who see handsets as a consumer electronics device to be differentiated in terms of branding, distribution and style and those like Nokia which argues that mobile phones are too complex to be commoditised in the manner of CD players or televisions.

Some weight was lent to Nokia's argument the following month when, in a foretaste of things to come, NTT DoCoMo was forced to recall 230,000 Panasonic handsets because of software bugs. Rapidly increasing functionality has left handsets more and more vulnerable to software malfunction and made integrating software and hardware increasingly tricky. In Japan alone a total of 2.5 million terminals were recalled over the course of the year, the latest a batch of 1,500 FOMA 3G phones from NEC. Koji Nishigaki, president of NEC, has been particularly vocal in his warnings about the complexities inherent in phones that are effectively small computers, and Nokia's Savander acknowledges that software is the greatest technical challenge that vendors face. Nokia now devotes around 80 per cent of its R&D spend to software developments.

Nishigaki's warnings were echoed in March by NTT DoCoMo head Keiji Tachikawa, who counseled caution on 3G. "I would like everyone to change their view [of 3G] … Initially it will be for business users, so there won't be a mass market." A sobering thought from the man who has overseen the explosion of the i-mode mass market. But one that made sense given the likely costs of next generation terminals and services, and the fact that business end-users are more likely to know what services they want. Robin Abrams, CEO of Bluekite, identifies a shift to focus on enterprise customers as one of the positive trends of the year, particularly as "we are at a Neanderthal stage in terms of wireless data." She argues that the enterprise sector can serve as a useful test-bed for data services while we wait for that new wireless business cycle to come around. "The Longer 3G is delayed the more pragmatic industry players will become about how they maximize the 2G learning curve."

But just how long will that interim period be? It partly depends on the technology. One of the highlights of the year has been the success of CDMAIX high-speed data networks in Korea, where operators have migrated over one million subscribers to new handsets and services relatively cheaply and efficiently. Data rates compare favorably with PC modems and certainly outperform GPRS in Europe. "There is no question that GPRS, which was anticipated to start delivering this year, has not [delivered effectively]," says Ben Wood, senior analyst at Gartner. And, it was fascinating to see Verizon Wirelessrub partner Vodafone up the wrong way in March by deciding to go with a CDMAIX upgrade path in the US rather than commit to a WCDMA migration. With Cingular opting for a $3 billion GSM migration in October and AT&T and VoiceStream expanding its GPRS services, America will be an intriguing battle ground for what Robillard calls the "tech holy war." For the time being at least, CDMA should have the edge.

But one central theme of the year has been that technology is not the issue, it is the provision of compelling services at an attractive price. A slightly exasperated Jane Zweig stressed this point at the UMTS World Congress 2001. "It is not about data rates, it is about profitable data rates." If the wireless industry can digest that message and act upon it, then it really will have come of age. All we have to do is to see what happened in the past. Now, we are in the mid of 2007, and in order to make predictions for the future, we should define the recession in our own industries. Here is what happened in Europe in the last couple of years;

In October 2002, an annual report was issued by Cambridge Econometrics to evaluate the a-year-ahead status of the recession, a different perspective that gives us another perspective to analyze such an industrial turmoil. As per the annual report, slower activity in world markets together with an appreciation of the euro and continued weakness in ICT demand is halting the recovery in manufacturing GDP growth across Western Europe is expected to be around 1% this year, with manufacturing output expected to fall by around 1½% over the same period. There are three factors that largely account for the broad decline in manufacturing prospects, aside from sector-specific developments.

In high-tech areas such as Communications and Computing Services, stronger growth is not expected in the short term. Computing Services is in the weak and patchy early stages of a recovery hampered by tight company budgets and the debts of many ICT companies. Early signs of recovery can be expected to turn into stronger demand from 2003, but the pace of growth is bound to be slower than in the late 1990s. Growth in communications should also pick up in 2003 when 3G services are finally introduced; in the meantime, mobile phone operators are suffering from a sharp slowdown in subscriber growth and delays to the introduction of the technology. In Financial Services, the introduction of the common currency in the euro-zone countries in January 2002 gave a new stimulus to the integration of the financial industry in Europe; and, in combination with other factors such as the emergence of e-commerce and the deepening of the European single market, this is expected to change the competitive environment in the financial services sector. As a result, output growth in this sector, at around 3% per annum, is expected to be among the fastest over the next four years. The overall prospects for employment are poor, however, as a result of extensive restructuring.

Help with sourcing a private mobile phone system

2009-04-09T17:55:48.000Z

We wish to develop a private mobile phone system for our company use. The Motorola Turbo radio phone system provides most needed functions except capability to take photos from a handheld phone and transfer photo file data (JPG) to other handheld users with-in the system. Can anyone suggest a system that can do this? Bert Sandlin Chicago

Mobile Working Guide for Directors

2008-09-02T16:00:00.000Z

Mobile Working Guide for SMEs - Vodafone.pdf

A guide to Mobile Working for Directors and SMEs, created by the Institute of Directors and Vodafone.