Scanning . . .
What’s in a name? The Association of Communications Technicians (ACT) is changing its name to the Alliance of Wireless Communications Engineers and Technicians (AWCET), and the Mobile Wireless Communications Alliance (MWCA) is the name selected for the group formed by the merger of the Association of Wireless System Integrators (AWSI) and the Specialized Mobile Radio Alliance (SMRA).
Whew!
All of these groups are membership sections of the Personal Communications Industry Association (PCIA), Alexandria, VA, by the way.
PCIA deserves credit for sustaining AWCET as a trade group for technical types involved with, okay, wireless communications. As I remember it, the group began as part of another organization, the National Association of Business and Educational Radio (NABER), which has since merged into PCIA. NABER formed ACT at about the same time that it responded to an FCC initiative to virtually discontinue technician licensing. NABER gave tests and issued certificates to technicians who passed them. The technicians mostly were employed by two-way radio dealerships, large private radio system operators and specialized mobile radio (SMR) system operators. Once certified, the technicians were encouraged to join ACT, and more than 2,000 of them did.
ACT became the largest membership section within NABER, but perhaps the least influential, and maybe the smallest source of revenue compared to the other sections and to frequency coordination.
Times have changed. PCIA represents, well, name the buzz-word: wireless messaging systems, wireless telephone systems and wireless radio systems (honest!). They used to be called paging, mobile phone and two-way radio, but the old names don’t fit well anymore.
So it is with the requirements for technical expertise. Technicians are needed, yes, but so are engineers; the distinctions include education, experience and sometimes state certification, as with a registered professional engineer. The name change reflects an organization prepared to embrace technical types with a wider range of backgrounds and skills than previously may have been the case, although the services already offered under the previous name can benefit many engineers.
The significance of the merger of AWSI and SMRA into MWCA might be a little less clear, although perhaps the continuing consolidation among dealerships (“wireless system integrators”) and among SMR system operators (“work-group wireless,” don’t you know) might be part of the reason. At one time, the interests of dealers and SMR operators were seen to be divergent enough to need separate representation. Now they aren’t, apparently.
There’s more competition for membership, too. The American Mobile Telecommunications Association (which, years ago, was called the American SMR Network Association) competes for SMR members. Small Business in Telecommunications (SBT) welcomes SMR operators, dealers and paging system operators, among others. As long as they’re small, SBT sees their interests as running in common. Then there’s the SMR WON trade group of SMR operators, too.
So maybe the AWSI-SMRA merger is a natural progression. If it results in more spectrum for private wireless and for work-group wireless, we’ll call it a winner.
Changes at APCO If garnering a spectrum allocation, not to mention dodging auctions, is the measurement of a winning trade association, then the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials_International (APCO) has to be toting a trophy. APCO led efforts to obtain more spectrum, and now public safety radio communications services seem set to receive about 24MHz of spectrum, someday, eventually, in a reallocation from TV broadcasting. (It’s almost certain, isn’t it? Congress says so, and that’s pretty reliable.)
Along with the promise of more spectrum, APCO, together with its federal and state partners, seems to have resolved its process to setstandards for digital radio in Project 25. The results were announced at the national convention in Charlotte, NC, in August.
Why, then, with these apparent successes, did APCO Executive Director Ronnie Rand resign, as of the last day of the convention? The announcement was made by APCO’s incoming elected president sort of offhandedly at the end of the banquet. Rand didn’t speak to the assembled membership. He wasn’t asked to, from the podium. Not to say he wasn’t asked beforehand. Maybe he said he didn’t want to, and that’s why he wasn’t asked to when the announcement was made. Whatever the case, it seemed odd.
Rand later told one of our editors that the parting was amicable and that he hasn’t settled his plans for post-APCO. He did say that he is leaving the association in a stronger financial condition than it was in when he became executive director several years ago. The APCO office didn’t offer any details about the transition.
APCO is one of the “Big Three” trade associations in this industry, and its agenda and policies are important. It would be newsworthy if there were a genuine disagreement between the board of officers and the executive director regarding the association’s agenda or policies. After all, Rand was selected by a board of officers long since gone. Maybe the current board just wanted someone else. It’s happened before.
The accomplishments on Rand’s watch have been important. Maybe that’s all that’s going to be said. –Don Bishop
