News
Allen Telecom appoints Electro-comm as super distributor Electro-comm Distributing, Denver, was appointed as an Allen Telecom “Super Distributor.” The Allen Telecom Group, Cleveland, consists of eight divisions including Antenna Specialists and Decibel Products.
A/S and Decibel products are in stock in Electro-comm’s warehouse in Denver, including mobile antennas, base antennas and filter products.
Electro-comm Distributing also added password-protected product search capabilities to its web page. Electro-comm’s customers can get the latest pricing 24 hours a day as well as find products by description, vendor or category.
Motorola targets smartcards for major new growth initiative Motorola, Schaumburg, IL, is entering the global smartcard business. It has introduced a new business unit, the Smartcard Systems Business (SSB). Motorola’s SSB will offer a portfolio of products that support multiple microprocessor-based smartcard applications and offer security. By driving open industry standards and developing new card and terminal operating systems, application programming interfaces (APIs) and developer’s tools, Motorola plans to shorten the time required for third-party developers to create smartcard software and load new applications during the card’s lifetime.
This new unit will be independent of Motorola’s Semiconductor Products Sector and will reside within the Land Mobile Products Sector in Schaumburg. The new business will be headed by Mark Davies, vice president of Motorola’s Smartcard Systems Business.
PageMart Wireless to supply paging products to Radio Shack PageMart Wireless, Dallas, has entered an agreement to supply paging products and services to Radio Shack, a nationwide paging retailer. PageMart has begun shipping product to more than 3,700 company-owned Radio Shack stores, which expect to begin selling pagers nationwide during the second quarter of 1997.
Radio Shack conducted a trial of PageMart’s products and services with 600 company-owned stores during 1996 in Hawaii and California prior to awarding the nationwide account.
Anritsu Wiltron opens its first North American facility Anritsu Wiltron, Morgan Hill, CA, opened its first North American manufacturing facility, part of its global strategy to better serve its customers. The facility is located in Morgan Hill.
The new production facility will initially produce Anritsu’s MT8801B radio communication analyzer, originally designed and engineered in Japan. Additional products will be added in the future, as demand warrants. The instruments, part of the Anritsu Manufacturing Division (AMD) product line, will be brand-labeled Anritsu and shipped from Morgan Hill to customers in the United States and to international customers.
Located next to the Wiltron Telecom Division’s manufacturing facilities, AMD will use manufacturing and assembly capabilities that have already been employed.
E.F. Johnson, Motorola pursue Twin Cities public-safety radio contract E.F. Johnson, Burnsville, MN, and Motorola’s Land Mobile Products Sector, Schaumburg, IL, are teaming up to propose building a new region-wide, digital trunked 800MHz public-safety radio system for the Twin Cities metro area. The proposal will be submitted to the state of Minnesota by Aug. 4, 1997.
The Metropolitan Radio Board, formed by the Metropolitan Council and made up of public-safety communications professionals and representatives from local government, has been working since 1991 to analyze needs and develop specifications for a new radio communications system. The current two-way radio systems, many of which are more than 20 years old, are incompatible and do not have enough capacity to handle the enormous volume of communications among various public-safety individuals and departments.
The first phase of the anticipated statewide system will cover nine counties. This phase will include Hennepin county, the city of Minneapolis and Minnesota state agencies located within this area. One of the key benefits of the new system will be that public safety and government employees in different counties, cities, departments and agencies will be able to better communicate with each other, especially during emergencies.
In October 1994, E.F. Johnson and Motorola signed a joint licensing agreement to promote compatibility of digital radio communications systems. Both companies can use common digital technology to develop future products that would be interoperable.
Columbia Spectrum Management acquired by P-Com Columbia Spectrum Management (CSM), Vienna, VA, is expanding its services to include program management for new network build-out on the national and international levels. The announcement came in the wake of the acquisition of CSM by P-Com, Campbell, CA, in March.
Since its founding in 1994, CSM has specialized in complete, turnkey microwave relocation and has served some of the nation’s PCS providers.
The company plans to provide a comprehensive line of program management services to wireless telecommunications companies building microwave, PCS, local loop, cellular and other wireless networks. These services include systems and program planning, engineering, equipment installation, testing and training, among others. CSM will also be responsible for turnkey program management services for P-Com customers worldwide.
Glenayre establishes $25,000 scholarship, endowment Glenayre Technologies. Charlotte, NC, has established a $25,000 scholarship endowment at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA. The scholarship provides $5,000 annually toward the tuition and related expenses for a period of five years to a student majoring in communications engineering. It is presented to foster technical expertise in the personal communications field. The Personal Communications Industry Association (PCIA) will administer the scholarship. Glenayre’s board of directors is also creating a 5-year endowment in which each board member personally contributes a minimum of $2,000 to the PCIA foundation.
Americall International awards AirNet $40-million equipment contract AirNet Communications, Melbourne, FL, has signed a purchase agreement for as much as $40 million to supply personal communications services (PCS) wireless infrastructure equipment and services to Americall International, Phoenix. Americall International successfully bid in the FCC’s PCS C-block and F-block auctions. The company announced that AirNet will be its sole provider of network infrastructure equipment.
Americall International has obtained the license to provide PCS service in 14 basic trading areas (BTAs) in five states including Alaska, Ohio, Oregon, Texas and West Virginia. The 14 BTAs have a population of 3.6 million. The system deployment will start in the third quarter of 1997 in the Corpus Christi and Laredo, TX, BTAs.
Under the terms of the agreement, consisting of a two-phased deployment plan, AirNet will supply and install a global system for mobile communications (GSM)-based PCS-1900 base station system (BSS). The system will include the ARE (AirNet range extender) products, which extend the coverage of a single AirNet broadband tranceiver systems (BTS) as much as 1,100 square miles.
Trident and Standard agree to technology alliance Standard Communications, Torrance, CA, and Trident Micro Systems, Huntington Beach, CA, have formally agreed to jointly develop and market products supporting Trident’s PassPort NTS trunking protocol.
The PassPort NTS enhanced trunking protocol provides SMR system operators with wide-area Smart Dispatch networking, more than 60,000 unique ID codes per site, voice mail, automatic registration and de-registration of roaming mobiles, over-the-air programming and other advanced features. The PassPort NTS infrastructure is an all-digital platform. Capable of supporting LTR and PassPort mobiles, the PassPort NTS system provides a ready migration path from current and next-generation analog radios to complete digital networks.
