Notes from the wireless field

The next print edition of Telephony (April 7, 2003) will feature an in-depth special report from last week's Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association's Wireless 2003 event. To sate your wireless appetite in the meantime, here's a random sampling of what various industry luminaries were saying at the show:

Tom Wheeler, CEO of the CTIA, on the role of wireless in the network hierarchy: "This industry has moved from a series of centralized hubs to a dispersed mixture of activity pushed to the edge of the cloud. Wireless enables individuals at the edge of the cloud."

Maurice Marks, chief technology officer for the network and service provider business unit of Hewlett-Packard: "My personal belief is that one of the biggest changes is moving from the network as the center of the universe to the subscriber as the center of the universe. In making that change, you have to let the subscriber be in control."

Teresa Vega, group president for wireless, cable and emerging markets at Telcordia, on how the company is recasting itself: "We're very conscious of the kind of culture change we're trying to forge in Telcordia. We need to talk about the 'new' Telcordia--a Telcordia that's able to quickly adapt, respond and be flexible."

Eric McHenry, vice president and general manager of the wireless network test division of Agilent Technologies, on the mobile data evolution: "Data testing in general is not yet really understood. We're constantly being asked how we can do end-to-end service testing for data."

Michael Mitsock, vice president of worldwide marketing and product management for Lightbridge, on the need for post-activation fraud control systems: "Whatever carriers do upfront to screen, sometimes people still leak through and do unsavory things on the network."

Pamela Reeve, CEO of Lightbridge, on how the current economic environment forces wireless carriers to be more careful in how they optimize networks and increase the lifetime value of customers: "When everything's growing rapidly, you can do everything with a meat cleaver. Now you need to do everything with a scalpel."

Des Owens, president of network performance software developer Actix, on the reduction in wireless carrier capex: "They are still spending money on necessary tools."

Rod Nelson, chief technology officer of AT&T Wireless Services, on why the carrier will continue to operate its TDMA network even as it turns up GSM: "Our advantage is in being able to use both networks for the proper audiences and have efficient capex as a result. We have an incumbent factory we can just keep reusing. We're not turning down the TDMA factory any time soon."

Scott Erickson, president of mobility solutions for Central and Latin America and Asia/Pacific at Lucent Technologies, on wireless carrier capex: "Capex spending is shifting from time division technologies to spread spectrum technologies."


Contact me at jmeyers@primediabusiness.com.