Analyze What?

Charles Simmons started a company when start-ups weren't yet fashionable, and he tested modems in telecom networks when very few people understood modem technology. Now he's ahead of the curve again, waiting for the long-promised implementation of E-911 capabilities in wireless handsets.

Simmons is the president of the Performance Analysis Group at Spirent Communications, a subsidiary of Spirent plc, the sprawling British technology giant. But like the best-hidden and most intricately designed figure within a Russian nesting doll, Simmons' group is one of the most intriguing elements of the Spirent family. It sits at the center of what looks to be a major technology migration in the wireless industry — assuming E-911 deployment can get past its awkward stage.

Spirent's Position Location Test System (PLTS) is a handset-oriented test solution for the location technologies being used to support federally mandated E-911 services. The PLTS is a closed-loop test system in which Spirent can control a phone in a simulated network environment and take measurements as its location changes. But the system isn't getting as much of a workout as Spirent would like, thanks to the much-documented delays that have haunted E-911 deployment.

“Very few carrier handsets are E-911-capable right now,” said Simmons, adding hopefully, “In the next 12 months, we should see a flood of handsets hitting the carrier labs, and that's when things will take off.”

With so many details of the E-911 implementation still in flux, Simmons said it is difficult to figure out what near-term revenue from PLTS sales will amount to, though lagging carrier deployment also means Spirent doesn't have much competition in the field of E-911 location service testing.

This feeling of solitude is one with which Simmons is no doubt familiar. Back in 1984, when Bell Labs was still owned by AT&T — and many years before the start-up bug bit telecom — he and two fellow Bell engineers set out to test the waters and walked away from their secure jobs at the nation's largest telco.

“We worked evenings and on weekends in our basements, and we came up with a network simulator product,” said Simmons. “We got a bank loan for $150,000, and started a company called Telecommunications Analysis. We were testing modems for use in telecom networks when nobody really knew what modems were.”

Simmons and his colleagues operated the company for about 10 years before they developed their first testing solution for wireless, and a few years after that, they sold their company to Bothorp, a German firm which later was acquired by Spirent Communications.

So again, Simmons is ahead of the game, but this time, he thinks the logjam is just about to break open, led by CDMA carriers. “They seem to be having an easier time of it,” he said.

Indeed, Verizon Wireless already has three handsets with E-911 service based on GPS location technology, and Sprint also has been at the forefront of new handset adoption. Accordingly, Spirent so far has targeted its PLTS only at CDMA carriers. Meanwhile, GSM carriers using E-911 location based on enhanced observed time difference (E-OTD) positioning technology, such as AT&T Wireless, have experienced significant delays: AT&T Wireless already has been fined about $2 million by the FCC for missing E-911 installation deadlines.

Simmons said that Spirent is aware of some of the technical glitches related to E-OTD, but because the technology's most problematic components are network-based, Spirent hasn't been involved. Nor has the company been involved in any of the troubled network deployments. “We provide timing accuracy testing for handsets, and the problem with E-911 today is in the network elements,” said Simmons.

Handset vendors such as Nokia have said that E-911 installation in handsets — and the accompanying testing processes — can't be done until carriers figure out their network deployments because the handsets are coordinated to network signaling.

Spirent is going to watch how GSM network deployment of E-911 plays out before it starts working with those network operators and vendors. “It's unclear what the final technology will be for these networks, whether it will be E-OTD or something else,” said Simmons. “We want to see how future development shakes out before we get further involved with GSM.”

As 2002 came to a close, that philosophy looked increasingly wise. Cingular Wireless and T-Mobile, carriers both committed to E-OTD, appealed to the FCC for extensions on their implementation deadlines. Both appeals were swiftly denied on the basis that “carriers have had plenty of time to work with their technologies,” as one FCC observer noted.

After that mid-December ruling, Cingular said it would stop deploying E-OTD technology in favor of a new, unidentified solution. However, the carrier said it still would support use of handsets with E-OTD already implemented. That means there could be at least a limited need for E-OTD testing solutions — eventually.

In the meantime, Spirent is bracing for more CDMA work to come its way. Though it primarily sells the PLTS directly to carriers, it has to be ready to test handsets from a variety of manufacturers as carriers use a growing number of vendor sources.

“The increasing number of handsets out there is both a challenge and an opportunity,” Simmons said. “That's why we are handset-agnostic.”

Aside from product sales, Spirent provides technical support for carriers as they test their relatively new and unfamiliar location technologies. “Carriers were formerly not so knowledgeable about technologies like GPS, but they have gotten a lot better at testing timing in these very complex networks where there are a lot of different RF signals running around,” said Simmons.

Some carriers and handset vendors may think they are comfortable enough with location technology to develop their own makeshift test solutions. That's what Nokia and a few other vendors have done, and Simmons said it is Spirent's primary competition for the PLTS so far. However, he discourages homemade test solutions. “Some engineers could piece together their own stuff to test the timing accuracy, but that kind of solution can give you erroneous measurements. Then you got another problem on your hands.” And that's the last thing carriers need right now.