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Welcome Back To The Wireless Messaging News I have had a busy week with a lot of family "drama" going on. My mother used to say that her revenge would be if my kids turned out to be just like me. Of course the opposite is often true when we realize: "Oh no I am becoming like my parents!" That should be enough to elicit a response from Jimmy Tucker or Burch Falkner — both southern gentlemen who like to pontificate in a humorous way.
Now on to more news and views. |
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A new issue of the Wireless Messaging Newsletter is posted on the web each week. A notification goes out by e-mail to subscribers on most Fridays around noon central US time. The notification message has a link to the actual newsletter on the web. That way it doesn’t fill up your incoming e-mail account. There is no charge for subscription and there are no membership restrictions. Readers are a very select group of wireless industry professionals, and include the senior managers of many of the world’s major Paging and Wireless Messaging companies. There is an even mix of operations managers, marketing people, and engineers — so I try to include items of interest to all three groups. It’s all about staying up-to-date with business trends and technology. I regularly get readers’ comments, so this newsletter has become a community forum for the Paging, and Wireless Messaging communities. You are welcome to contribute your ideas and opinions. Unless otherwise requested, all correspondence addressed to me is subject to publication in the newsletter and on my web site. I am very careful to protect the anonymity of those who request it. I spend the whole week searching the Internet for news that I think may be of interest to you — so you won’t have to. This newsletter is an aggregator — a service that aggregates news from other news sources. You can help our community by sharing any interesting news that you find.
Editorial Opinion pieces present only the opinions of the author. They do not necessarily reflect the views of any of advertisers or supporters. This newsletter is independent of any trade association. I don't intend to hurt anyone's feelings, but I do freely express my opinions. Subscribe IT'S FREE * required field If you would like to subscribe to the newsletter just fill in the blanks in the form above, and then click on the “Subscribe” button. There is no charge for subscription and there are no membership restrictions. It’s all about staying up-to-date with business trends and technology. The Wireless Messaging News
The Board of Advisor members are people with whom I have developed a special rapport, and have met personally. They are not obligated to support the newsletter in any way, except with advice, and maybe an occasional letter to the editor. |
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After Massive Quakes, Millions in Mexico Turn to Early Warning AppOct. 19, 2017, at 5:42 p.m.
REUTERS By Sheky Espejo MEXICO CITY (Reuters) — Since two massive earthquakes hit Mexico in September, claiming more than 460 lives, an early warning start-up called SkyAlert has doubled its users to 5.8 million, making it one of the country's most downloaded apps. SkyAlert has also found a market selling alarms to small businesses in the capital, said its co-founder and director Alvaro Velasco. And it is looking to expand to Latin America, mainly Colombia, Peru and Chile, which lack an official alerting system despite frequent quakes in those countries. Velasco said that he and SkyAlert co-founder Alejandro Cantú are talking to investors from Mexico and elsewhere about raising 100 million pesos ($5.35 million) in capitalization in 2018. He said the surge in users after the most recent deadly quake in Mexico City had heightened the interest of existing investors including U.S.-based American Messaging and attracted interest from two Mexico-based private equity funds. American Messaging did not respond to requests to comment on any potential new investment. Velasco said SkyAlert was in talks with those funds and existing investors to inject around 20 million pesos (1.05 million dollars) into SkyAlert. Still, finding a sustainable business model for the quake monitoring app has been a challenge partly because recent regulation in Mexico City has limited SkyAlert's ability to access funds through public financing. MAKING A PROFIT NOT EASY Shomit Ghose at Onset Ventures, a U.S. private equity company with experience in software start-ups, said quake apps have struggled to get adequate financing because of the lack of a clear path to profits. "If the business model is B2B where the earthquake early-warning is sent to companies, or railways, or hospitals, or high-buildings then perhaps a strong B2B case can be made for start-up investment," Ghose said. SkyAlert's predicament echoes that of companies seeking funding to develop earthquake alert apps in the United States. Seismic activity is hard to monetize without government support. It competes with its former partner, Mexico's official alerting system run by government-funded non profit CIRES, which was created after an earthquake in 1985 killed thousands in the country. One of the world's few widely deployed seismic alarms, CIRES runs a network of sirens positioned around Mexico City that warn of a coming quake. SkyAlert mainly warns people through a mobile app. Both sell quake warning systems, but a 2016 regulatory reform requires public buildings in Mexico City to purchase alarm systems from CIRES, limiting SkyAlert's public financing. SkyAlert initially replicated CIRES' alerts, but in 2015 it decided to deploy its own detection sensors to increase coverage with greater accuracy, Velasco said. "After a few false alerts from CIRES that affected SkyAlert's credibility, we decided to invest in our own technology," he said. SkyAlert also is exploring ways to monetize its free app. Currently, it sells a "premium" version for $4 a year that allows users to personalize alerts. However, Mexico has an average per capita income of $8,200, and the company said only around 4 percent of users pay for it. Velasco said SkyAlert's revenue is split fairly evenly between those fees and income from selling to businesses. The newest version of the app allows for paid advertising, but ads would not be visible during a seismic alert. SkyAlert, founded in 2011, has few peers, but one similar service in Japan is called YureKuru Call, which relies on government seismic data. YureKuru has received some government funding on an ad-hoc basis, but like SkyAlert is mostly funded by fees, said Rina Suzuki, an official at RC Solution Co., the Tokyo-based firm that developed YureKuru. Detection technologies are evolving and they are all perfectible, Jennifer Strauss, external relations officer at the Berkeley Seismology Lab told Reuters. "In the end, what matters is how effective they are at alerting people to save lives," said Strauss. (Additional reporting by Christine Murray in Mexico City and Minami Funakoshi in Tokyo; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel and Diane Craft) Copyright 2017 Thomson Reuters. |
| Source: | U.S. News |
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Tales In Tech History: BlackBerryTom Jowitt, October 20, 2017, 8:02 am Ultimate survivor. The rise, fall, and rise (?) of former smartphone giant BlackBerry BlackBerry is perhaps the ultimate survivor in a mobile world that has already seen the likes of Microsoft defeated against the combined might of Android and iOS. It is worth remembering that for many years mobile users were not just limited to these two platforms. Indeed, there was plenty of other platforms to choose from including Symbian, Jolla Sailfish, Tizen, Windows Mobile (and then Windows Phone) and of course BlackBerry OS, which was made by a Canadian company called Research in Motion. But how did BlackBerry survive in a world where the choice of available smartphone platforms has now shrunk down to just two viable options?
The Rise Of RIMResearch in Motion (RIM) was created way back in 1984 by Mike Lazardis (aged just 23) and Douglas Fregin. This was at a time before mobile phones were a reality for everyday people. Back then people communicated via pagers while out and about, or if you were rich a carphone. During its early years, the Waterloo, Ontario-based company set itself up doing a number of different projects. First off there was Budgie, an LED sign business that was contracted by General Motors to communicate to workers on its assembly lines. But that business never really took off and RIM’s owners decided to offload the venture and look at other possibilities. Another one of these projects was the DigiSync film reader. This was pretty good as it was wanted by Hollywood studios thanks to its syncing technology. This allowed movie editors for example to reduce the time it took to turn lots of film content into useable content in post-production. Indeed, the technology was so popular that RIM even won both an Emmy and a technical achievement from the Academy Awards. Despite that, it was always a sideshow for RIM’s founders. Messaging was RIM’s ambition, and RIM began to work with a number of industry players and one of these was Ericsson. The two firms worked together to develop the technology that would eventually be used in pagers and wireless payment processing systems. This would become the foundation of the BlackBerry OS going forward. RIM’s agreement with Ericsson’s Mobitex wireless network allowed RIM to create pagers in North America that operated as a two-way communicators, which was an advanced concept at the time, as cellular networks didn’t do data at that time. RIM therefore set itself up as the first wireless data technology developer in North America and the first company outside Scandinavia to develop connectivity products for Mobitex wireless packet-switched data communications networks, which became widely used by by military and police forces, firefighters and ambulance services around the world. Despite some setbacks, RIM remained committed to the technology, and it captured the imagination of a Harvard graduate Jim Balsillie. So much so that Balsillie, aged just 33 years old, decided to invest $250,000 of his own money into RIM by re-mortgaging his house in 1992. Balsillie would later become co-CEO of RIM alongside Lazaridis.
In 1996, RIM released the Inter@ctive Pager, also known as the RIM 900, its first keyboard-based device. This was the start of BlackBerry’s success, as the company now had three key elements, namely a communications network, a device, and the software that connected the two. RIM went public on the Toronto Stock Exchange in 1997 and in 1998 it released the RIM 950, a dramatically slimmed down two-way pager. Then in 1999 it received FCC approval in the United State to begin selling its first BlackBerry device, the 850, with mobile e-mail. BlackBerry initially gained market share in the mobile industry by concentrating on email. It also began to offer e-mail services on non-BlackBerry devices, such as the Palm Treo, via its proprietary BlackBerry Connect software. The terror attacks of 9/11 and the 2001 anthrax scare really made a case for BlackBerry as a secure communications device. The American government for example became RIM’s biggest customer with over half a million of the devices. The BlackBerry 5810 released in 2002 added voice calling capabilities to the device, and new devices came with a colour screen, as the number of users skyrocketed. By 2005 RIM had four million subscribers, and Balsillie and Lazaridis are named among Time magazine’s 100 most influential people. Then in 2006 RIM began to look beyond the enterprise market and released the first in a line of consumer-friendly Pearl devices, adding a digital camera and multimedia capabilities. That strategy paid off and by 2007 RIM had 10 million subscribers and it released the first of its Curve BlackBerry handsets. The FallBut like Nokia, RIM was caught by napping by the arrival of the Apple iPhone in 2007. Over the next four years its battle with Apple (and Android) intensified, despite BlackBerry’s endorsement from President Barack Obama.
The Queen even visited BlackBerry’s headquarters in 2010. The Queen was said to be a long-standing fan of the BlackBerry ever since the Duke of York (Prince Andrew) first introduced her to the handsets back in 2007.
When Apple released the iPad in 2010, RIM reacted quickly, but released the unpolished PlayBook in 2011. Initial reviews of the Playbook were not positive, not helped by the fact that the PlayBook unbelievably lacked the connectivity to popular BlackBerry functions such as email and instant messenger.
RIM began to realise it was in trouble as it struggled with an aging handset portfolio to maintain a grip on its core enterprise market in the face of a growing challenge from Android and Apple. Several months later RIM revealed it would cut 2,000 jobs, and matters were not helped in October 2011, when users around the world suffered a four-day service outage. Both Lazaridis and Balsillie, two of the company’s biggest shareholders, reduced their salaries to $1. But the pressure was starting to tell. In 2011 co-CEO Mike Lazaridis walked out of an interview with the BBC’s technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones after he deemed some of his questions unfair.
And 2012 also proved to be a year of big changes for Research in Motion. Both Lazaridis and Balsillie stepped down as co-CEOs and were replaced by Thorsten Heins, RIM’s former chief operating officer. Within months Heins announced 5,000 layoffs and a delay to the critical BlackBerry 10 software update, which is seen as the company’s last chance to stay alive. BlackBerry hit its peak in 2013 with 85 million BlackBerry subscribers worldwide, but finances at the company were increasingly dire despite the release of Blackberry 10, and there was talk of the company being sold to its largest shareholder, or even being broken up and its valuable patents sold off to the highest bidder. This was the same year when the name Research in Motion was dropped, and the firm thereafter became known simply as BlackBerry. It was also the year when Thorsten Heins’ short lived reign at BlackBerry ended, and former Sybase CEO John Chen was brought in to steady the ship. Chen from the outset didn’t feel that BlackBerry could continue making handsets, but he refused proposals from several technology companies for various BlackBerry assets on grounds that a break-up did not serve the interest of all stakeholders. In 2014 BlackBerry released a number of noteworthy handsets including the Passport, and the BlackBerry Classic. Other handsets continued to follow, and Blackberry continued to sell smartphones, but in 2015 with the release of the BlackBerry Priv slider and then the BlackBerry DTEK50, it decided all future handsets would all be Android-based. And then in September 2016 Chen finally got his way, and Blackberry announced it would cease designing its own phones in favour of licensing them to partners. The RiseYet despite all this, there is reason to be optimistic about BlackBerry’s future. The firm has a veritable treasure trove of patents, and it has an important stake in a rapidly growing market thanks to RIM’s decision in 2010 to buy QNX, which offers in-vehicle infotainment and telematics systems. But for many the parallels with Nokia are obvious. Both BlackBerry and Nokia were icons of their respective nations. Both were dominant at the turn of the decade. Both have now exited the smartphone market after failing to keep up with the times. Yet BlackBerry remains an important tech player, albeit a diminished one. Its financials have improved, and it is once again reporting strong enterprise sales. Under the leadership of John Chen, BlackBerry has benefited from its retreat as a smartphone-only firm, and instead turned its attention to software, security and automotive systems for cars. BlackBerry has the pedigree and the technology to still go a long way. |
| Source: | silicon |
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How Unifying Critical Communications Can Help Emergency RespondersWith increasing pressure on emergency response agencies to deliver in times of crisis, choosing the best communications system possible is crucial. Offering numerous benefits to both the public and first responders, a unified critical communications investment is the solution. BY TAIT COMMUNICATIONS / OCTOBER 19, 2017
And systems are getting better every day, as there continue to be great advances in critical communications. Mobile applications can now share information, video and text between field responders and the back office, often simultaneously sharing with multiple operatives. And a new generation of users (and greater ICT influence) demand a choice of devices to gain immediate access to this information. While quality PMR voice communications remain vital, they no longer meet every communication need. To meet all these needs and deliver the maximum benefit and value of each technology with the least number of disadvantages, first response agencies need to consider genuine unified critical communications — integrating several technologies to coexist seamlessly and connect individual devices across PMR, LTE and WiFi. The case for unifying your critical communicationsTo meet complex communications requirements, employing multiple bearer networks becomes the reality. Unified critical communications create a network of networks, so that no matter where you are, and what conditions you’re working under, the system will choose the best bearer. This ensures that no matter which device is used, the message — voice, text, video, images, applications, or any combination — will be transferred efficiently, securely, reliably, seamlessly and in real time. For first responders dealing with so many unknowns, having a dependable communications system is vital. How can unified critical communications support emergency response now?ROAMING ACROSS NETWORKS Officers and first responders often carry both a smartphone and a portable radio. Smartphones are great for their broadband data capabilities, but the public networks they depend on may be unreliable in rural areas, and are often overcrowded during emergencies. Private radio networks have great wide-area coverage, security, and resilience but may struggle in densely built up areas — particularly in buildings with energy-efficient glass and thick concrete walls. Solutions like UnifyVoice connect users to radio, cellular, and WiFi networks on a single device. The intelligent software automatically detects the best available bearer networks, even changing networks during a call if the original network ceases to work. The constant, reliable voice communications allow rescue and recovery efforts to continue unhindered by the worry of losing contact. CONNECTIVITY, COMPUTING POWER, AND APPLICATION ON THE MOVE Few things are more frustrating than not being able to communicate when you need to, and in emergency situations it’s absolutely critical. As technology convergence increases complexity and puts added demands on your communication system, solutions like UnifyVehicle create a local network of networks, including PMR, WiFi, wireless broadband, Bluetooth (and more), using your vehicle’s mobile radio as a base. Field responders can communicate when they need to, using their preferred device and the best available bearer, from a local network providing connectivity wherever they go. This is especially useful because emergencies often happen with no warning and little preparation time, in a wide variety of terrains and areas. UnifyVehicle ensures first responders’ communications are always ready to go. 4 WAYS UNIFIED CRITICAL COMMUNICATIONS CAN BENEFIT EMERGENCY RESPONSE Increased awareness Users are no longer restricted to communicating via status messages or voice. Unified voice and data across multiple networks means a wide range of situational information — voice, text, video, images or any other data — can be shared with the right people by the fastest and most reliable method. This gives first responders access to enhanced data before arriving on scene, ensuring they’re fully prepared. Enhanced operability With a choice of bearer always available, first responders can communicate dynamically with other emergency response agencies across any network they have in common. This enables dependable coordination of rescue and recovery efforts. Improved coverage No single technology can provide communication across the diverse terrain, variable demand and proliferating data that your organization needs. Designed to exact requirements, a unified critical communications system minimizes coverage “black spots”, giving first responders the wide coverage area they need to stay in contact. Increased safety First responders who understand and trust their communication networks feel safer, and more confident. They know that should an accident, injury or emergency occur, they are not alone. User safety features, location data and alerts can operate across different networks and provide real time visibility, so dispatch knows instantly when and where help is needed. While this is a good introduction to unified critical communications, it is just the beginning. A Tait unified critical communications network is not a static solution that you implement and leave. In addition to all of the benefits offered by your investment today, your solution can develop and advance as upgrades, new features and applications create new and exciting opportunities for the future. |
| Source: | Emergency Management |
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| Swissphone |
Disaster-Proven Paging for Public SafetyPaging system designs in the United States typically use a voice radio-style infrastructure. These systems are primarily designed for outdoor mobile coverage with modest indoor coverage. Before Narrowbanding, coverage wasn’t good, but what they have now is not acceptable! The high power, high tower approach also makes the system vulnerable. If one base station fails, a large area loses their paging service immediately! Almost every technology went from analog to digital except fire paging. So it’s time to think about digital paging! The Disaster-Proven Paging Solution (DiCal) from Swissphone offers improved coverage, higher reliability and flexibility beyond anything that traditional analog or digital paging systems can provide. Swissphone is the No. 1 supplier for digital paging solutions worldwide. The Swiss company has built paging networks for public safety organizations all over the world. Swissphone has more than 1 million pagers in the field running for years and years due to their renowned high quality. DiCal is the digital paging system developed and manufactured by Swissphone. It is designed to meet the specific needs of public safety organizations. Fire and EMS rely on these types of networks to improve incident response time. DiCal systems are designed and engineered to provide maximum indoor paging coverage across an entire county. In a disaster situation, when one or several connections in a simulcast solution are disrupted or interrupted, the radio network automatically switches to fall back operating mode. Full functionality is preserved at all times. This new system is the next level of what we know as “Simulcast Paging” here in the U.S.
Swissphone offers high-quality pagers, very robust and waterproof. Swissphone offers the best sensitivity in the industry, and battery autonomy of up to three months. First responder may choose between a smart s.QUAD pager, which is able to connect with a smartphone and the Hurricane DUO pager, the only digital pager who offers text-to-voice functionality. Bluetooth technology makes it possible to connect the s.QUAD with a compatible smartphone, and ultimately with various s.ONE software solutions from Swissphone. Thanks to Bluetooth pairing, the s.QUAD combines the reliability of an independent paging system with the benefits of commercial cellular network. Dispatched team members can respond back to the call, directly from the pager. The alert message is sent to the pager via paging and cellular at the same time. This hybrid solution makes the alert faster and more secure. Paging ensures alerting even if the commercial network fails or is overloaded. Swissphone sets new standards in paging: Paging Network
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Swissphone provides a proven solution at an affordable cost. Do you want to learn more? |
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California Senators Press FCC on Wireless Alerts Failure During Fires
UPDATE Earlier this week, California Senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris sent a pointed and heartfelt letter to the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regarding the shortcomings in the emergency alert systems, made evident during the (ongoing) northern California wildfires. While wildfires continue to blaze in the northern part of the state, with over 40 people dead and more than 40,000 people evacuated, this crisis has brought to light challenges with the emergency telecom system. The senators called out to FCC chairman Ajit Pai that, “emergency services in Northern California were not able to transmit lifesaving WEA (Wireless Emergency Alert) messages, because of significant technical deficiencies in the system.” The importance of timely notifications via mobile devices “in a crisis like this…can be the difference between life and death.” The same WEA system is used for Amber Alerts and counts on cell towers within a specific area to transmit emergency messages to cell phone users, unless they’ve opted out. However, because of inadequacies in the system where precise geo-targeting was not enabled, local authorities in Sonoma and Napa counties, for example, were “caught in a bind between notifying individuals in imminent danger and risking mass panic.” Geo-targeting “is a feature that has been standard in mobile applications for years,” and even though the FCC approved the proposal enabling the precise geo-targeting of WEA warnings over a year ago, they’ve failed to issue final rules to wireless carriers. The California senators have requested that the FCC respond to the inquiries presented in their letter by October 24. They want to know whether the FCC has solicited feedback from emergency services in California and from those affected by Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Jose regarding the WEA plus the timeline for the WEA rulemaking. SPEED Act Introduced Late Yesterday to “Streamline Permitting”The acronym stands for: “Streamlining Permitting to Enable Efficient Deployment of Broadband Infrastructure Act of 2017” . . . or the “SPEED Act,” which was introduced yesterday evening by Sens. Roger Wicker and Catherine Cortez Masto. (see link above for document) The bill states its purpose to “streamline broadband infrastructure permitting on established public rights-of-way and for other purposes.” The Act is intended to form a committee that “within 60 days of its enactment shall submit a report to the appropriate committees of Congress that contains an analysis of the challenges to and administrative delays in efficiently siting communications facilities installations on Federal land.” Industry trade association WIA was first to react with their approval. “This bill is a strong continuation of the efforts to remove unnecessary regulatory barriers to broadband deployment,” said Matt Mandel, Head of Legislative Affairs for WIA. “Many of these barriers often prevent private companies from investing in and deploying broadband networks in communities around the country. We applaud Sens. Roger Wicker and Catherine Cortez Masto for their leadership on this piece of legislation, and hope more members of Congress will realize how important broadband infrastructure is to the economic prosperity of the United States. WIA looks forward to working with Sens. Wicker and Cortez Masto on this bill and other efforts to provide for the responsible deployment of next generation broadband all around the country.”
Safety Summit Produces Checklist From Black & VeatchWednesday’s Northeast Wireless Safety Summit provided a variety of informative speakers and presentations during the one-day event in Fairfield, NJ. Black & Veatch safety experts Philip Grubbs and Edward Williams presented attendees with a safety checklist that they follow from job to job entitled “Think, Plan, Act”. See the link above to activate the presentation. |
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| Source: | Inside Towers newsletter | Courtesy of the editor of Inside Towers. |
| BloostonLaw Newsletter |
Selected portions [sometimes more — sometimes less] of the BloostonLaw Telecom Update and/or the BloostonLaw Private Users Update — newsletters from the Law Offices of Blooston, Mordkofsky, Dickens, Duffy & Prendergast, LLP — are reproduced in this section of The Wireless Messaging News with kind permission from the firm. The firm's contact information is included at the end of this section of the newsletter.
FCC Announces Access Tariff Filing Requirements under BDS OrderOn October 13, the FCC released an Order establishing procedures for the filing of access charge tariff revisions and Tariff Review Plans (TRPs) for incumbent local exchange carriers (LECs) subject to price cap regulation (price cap LECs) pursuant to the FCC’s Business Data Services Order. Price cap LECs are required to make such filings to implement the new productivity offset (or X-factor) adopted in the Business Data Services Order, to become effective on December 1, 2017. Petitions to suspend or reject 15-day tariff filings are due November 24, and petitions to suspend or reject 7-day tariff filings are due November 29. BloostonLaw Contacts: Ben Dickens, Gerry Duffy, and Mary Sisak. HeadlinesFCC Seeks Comment on MF-II Challenge Areas; Affected Clients Should Evaluate ImpactOn October 18, the FCC issued a Public Notice seeking comment on the challenge process to resolve disputes about areas presumptively ineligible for Mobility Fund Phase II (MF-II). Comments are due November 8, and reply comments are due November 29. In the Public Notice, the FCC seeks comment on the steps it intends to use to process the coverage and subsidy data it collects as a part of the upcoming 4G LTE data collection, and to create the coverage data map that will be used in the challenge process. The Public Notice also proposes specific parameters for the data that challengers and respondents will submit as part of the challenge process, as well as a process for validating challenges. In order to create the map, the FCC is proposing to: 1) remove any subsidized areas from the provider’s coverage map; 2) remove any water-only areas; 3) overlay a uniform grid with cells of one square kilometer (1 km by 1 km) on the provider’s coverage map; and 4) remove grid cells with coverage of less than an area approximately equal to the minimum area that could be covered by a single speed test measurement when buffered. FCC staff would then generate the map of presumptively eligible areas for each state with the following steps: 5) merging the maps of unsubsidized coverage for all providers; 6) removing the merged unsubsidized coverage generated in step 5 (the ineligible areas) from the state’s boundary to produce the eligible areas; and 7) removing any water-only areas from the eligible areas. The resulting map of presumptively eligible areas (overlaid with the uniform grid) for each state or state equivalent would then be made available to the public. Once the map is available, the FCC is proposing to require providers to identify at least one device that is either: (a) officially supported by the latest versions of drive test software, such as JDSU, ZK-SAM, Rohde & Schwartz, TEMS, or Ookla; or (b) engineering-capable and able to be unlocked and put into diagnostic mode in order to interface with drive test software. Then, the FCC proposes to require a speed test be conducted between 6:00 AM and 12:00 AM (midnight) local time. Finally, the FCC proposes to require the following data: signal strength and latency; the service provider identity and device used (which must be from that provider’s list of pre-approved handsets); the international mobile equipment identity (IMEI) of the tested device; the method of the test (i.e., software-based drive test or non-drive test app-based test); and, if an app was used to conduct the measurement, the identity and version of the app. The FCC is also proposing to adopt an automated system to validate challenge submissions. The validation process would consist of four steps: 1) validate that the sum of all challenged areas in a state is greater than or equal to one square kilometer; 2) conduct an initial check for each speed test record submitted to ensure that the data parameters are consistent with all adopted requirements and that the file matches the file specification; 3) calculate the speed test buffer area, thereby determining the density of submitted speed tests and implementing step three of the validation framework; and 4) merge the unmeasured area of all providers in a grid cell to determine the aggregated unmeasured area where the challenger has not submitted sufficient speed test evidence for every provider. If the challenge fails any of these steps, it would be rejected and a warning message would explain to the challenger why the challenge was rejected. The FCC intends to create accounts for all service providers, using contact information submitted by a filer in its Form 477 filing data as of June 30, 2017, so they may participate in the challenge process. If a filer wants to use contact information other than the contact it submitted for its Form 477 for purposes of accessing the USAC portal, or if a filer wishes to add other users, we propose that it email the Commission and provide its provider name, the first and last name of the user(s) it wishes to grant access to the portal, and the email address(es) of the user(s), up to a maximum of three users. Finally, the FCC expects to make public a map of areas presumptively eligible for MF-II support no earlier than four weeks after the deadline for submission of the new, one-time 4G LTE provider coverage data. The FCC proposes to have the challenge process window open on the next business day, and to have it close 150 days later. Carriers interested in submitting comments or reply comments on the challenge process should contact the firm for more information. A copy of the full Public Notice can be found here, and the appendix mapping carriers’ names in the 477 filing to their names in the challenge system can be found here. BloostonLaw Contacts: John Prendergast, Cary Mitchell, and Sal Taillefer. FCC Establishes Comment Deadlines for Multiple ProceedingsOn October 13, a trio of FCC items appeared in the Federal Register, establishing comment and reply comment deadlines for each. Comments are due on November 13 in all three proceedings. Reply comments are due on November 27, except in the Toll Free Assignment Modernization proceeding, where reply comments are due December 13. Specifically: Revisions to Reporting Requirements for HAC Mobile Handsets. In this proceeding, the FCC seeks comment on whether to exempt a service provider that is not a Tier I carrier (Non-Tier I Service Provider) from the annual FCC Form 655 reporting requirements or otherwise to modify these requirements, while maintaining the reporting requirements for Tier I carriers and all handset manufacturers. The FCC also seeks comment on whether the annual reporting requirements for Non-Tier I Service Providers are still necessary to achieve the FCC's objectives for adopting the reporting requirements and whether the burden of complying with these reporting requirements for Non-Tier I Service Providers outweighs the associated benefits. Comments are due November 13, and reply comments are due November 27. BloostonLaw has prepared comments advocating that onerous HAC reports be eliminated for small carriers. Any client interested in participating in the comments should contact us promptly (unless they have already responded to our recent call to action). Toll Free Assignment Modernization. In this proceeding, the FCC seeks comment on allowing the FCC to assign numbers by auction, on a first-come, first-served basis, by an alternative assignment methodology, or by a combination of methodologies. The FCC also seeks comment on allowing a secondary market for toll free numbers and on setting aside toll free numbers necessary to promote health and safety for use, without cost, by government agencies and non-profit health and safety organizations. Comments are due November 13, and reply comments are due December 12. Maintenance of Copies of FCC Rules. In this proceeding, the FCC proposes to eliminate the requirements that licensees or permittees of low power TV, TV translator, and TV booster stations maintain “a current copy of Volume I and Volume III of the FCC's rules;” that licensees or permittees of FM translator and FM booster stations maintain “a current copy of Volumes I (parts 0, 1, 2 and 17) and III (parts 73 and 74) of the FCC's rules.”; and that certain cable operators maintain a current copy of part 76 of the FCC's rules and, if subject to the Emergency Alert System (EAS) rules contained in part 11 of those rules, an EAS Operating Handbook. Comments are due November 13, and reply comments are due November 27. Carriers interested in participating in any of these proceedings should contact the firm for more information. BloostonLaw Contacts: Ben Dickens and John Prendergast. FCC Issues Official Agenda for October Open MeetingOn October 17, the FCC issued the official agenda for its next Open Meeting, which will take place on Tuesday, October 24, 2017. At the Meeting, the FCC will consider:
Each summary above contains a link to the draft text of each item, including a one-page cover sheet. As always, Open Meetings are streamed live at www.fcc.gov/live and can be followed on social media with #OpenMtgFCC. BloostonLaw Contacts: Ben Dickens, Gerry Duffy, and John Prendergast. Law & RegulationFCC Seeks Comments on Disclosure of Numbering Data to DOJOn October 13, the FCC issued a Public Notice seeking comment on the disclosure of information contained in each Numbering Resource Utilization and Forecast (NRUF) report filed with the FCC by wireless telecommunications carriers from December 2015 through the present to the Department of Justice. The Department also requested local number portability (LNP) data in the FCC’s possession related to wireless telecommunications carriers, by carrier and by rate center, from January 2016 to the present. Comments are due October 24. In general, the FCC may share information it has collected with another government agency, and that all provisions of law that relate to the unlawful disclosure of information apply to the employees of the agency to which the information is released. Although the FCC’s regulations provide that proprietary and commercially sensitive information will be withheld from public disclosure, subject to the public’s right to seek disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act, the FCC indicates that it may disclose to other federal agencies records that have been submitted to the FCC in confidence upon another agency’s request pursuant. Affected parties have 10 days from the date of this notice to oppose disclosure of NRUF and LNP data to the Department of Justice. If the FCC receives no opposition from affected parties within 10 days of this notice, the FCC will disclose the information requested above to the Justice Department. BloostonLaw Contacts: Ben Dickens, Gerry Duffy, and John Prendergast. House Subcommittee Approves Draft FCC Reauthorization BillOn October 11, the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Communications and Technology approved draft legislation on reauthorizing and reforming the FCC. The bill will now move on to the full committee for a vote. Proposed changes to the FCC’s process include:
In a statement, Commissioner O’Rielly said, “I applaud the Subcommittee on its mark-up of the FCC Reauthorization Act. This legislation codifies key process reforms Chairman Pai and I have championed and that have been adopted into our daily procedures at the Commission. Making these permanent will ensure certainty and transparency to the agency for the future. I look forward to working with the Committee on additional items to further strengthen FCC process and on other key issues.” BloostonLaw Contacts: Ben Dickens, Gerry Duffy, and Mary Sisak. Senators Reach Out to Robocalling “Mastermind”On October 11, U.S. Sens. John Thune (R-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), chairman of the Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, Insurance, and Data Security, requested information from the alleged perpetrator of “one of the largest spoofed robocall campaigns ever investigated by the Federal Communications Commission.” The committee’s request to Adrian Abramovich of Marketing Strategy Leaders, Inc., seeks information about alleged actions, including records of robocalls made by his business and its relationship to other businesses and contractors. The committee’s inquiry to Abramovich requested the following information no later than October 24, 2017:
As we reported in a previous edition of the BloostonLaw Telecom Update, the FCC issued a Notice of Apparent Liability against Abramovich in the amount of $120 million back in June of this year, for having apparently made nearly 100 million spoofed robocalls. BloostonLaw Contacts: John Prendergast and Richard Rubino. FCC Enters $17 Million Settlement with Verizon over NYC E-Rate Investigation On October 17, the FCC announced that it reached a settlement with Verizon for possible violations of the FCC’s competitive bidding rules for the E-rate program. Verizon agreed to pay $17.68 million to resolve parallel investigations by the FCC and U.S. Department of Justice, $17.325 million of which will be repaid to the Universal Service Fund (USF). Verizon has further agreed to withdraw any rights it may have to hundreds of millions of dollars in requested and undisbursed E-rate support. This settlement follows an investigation into Verizon’s involvement with New York City schools’ use of the Erate program. The FCC’s Enforcement Bureau conducted its investigation in parallel with the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Fraud Section and U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. In related actions, former New York City Department of Education consultant Willard “Ross” Lanham was convicted by a federal jury sitting in the Southern District of New York. To resolve the FCC and Justice Department investigations, Verizon will pay $17.325 million to the Universal Service Fund through the FCC settlement and $354,634 to the U.S. Treasury through the Justice Department settlement. In addition, Verizon will surrender any claims against the Universal Service Fund it may have to approximately $7,303,668 in undisbursed E-rate support for products and services provided to the New York City Department of Education between Funding Years 2002 and 2013. Furthermore, Verizon will surrender any appeal rights before the Universal Service Administrative Company and the FCC in connection with more than $100 million in E-rate support for which the New York City Department of Education has withdrawn requests for support through its 2015 settlement with the FCC. As part of the FCC’s settlement, Verizon will also operate under a compliance plan for three years. BloostonLaw Contacts: Gerry Duffy and Sal Taillefer. IndustryMerger Announcement Between T-Mobile and Sprint Expected SoonReuters is reporting that T-Mobile US, Inc. and Sprint Corp. plan to announce a merger agreement without any pre-emptive announcements on divestitures. The merger, if approved, would combine the nation’s third and fourth-largest wireless carriers in the U.S. According to a UBS research analyst, the FCC will likely force T-Mobile and Sprint to make some divestitures of spectrum, since the combined company would have the most airwaves in its sector with more than 300 MHz, putting it ahead of Verizon’s and AT&T’s holdings. Companies commonly pre-announce what assets they are planning to sell as a strategy for gaining regulatory approval for a merger. However, sources quoted by Reuters believe the companies are seeking to preserve their spectrum holdings as much as possible and expect challenging negotiations with antitrust and telecom regulators. T-Mobile and Sprint believe that the U.S. antitrust enforcement environment has become more favorable since the companies abandoned their previous effort to combine in 2014 amid regulatory concerns, according to the Reuters report. FCC Initiates Hearing Over Sprint/Indiana 800MHz Rebanding DisputesOn October 17, the FCC issued a Hearing Designation Order granting a Petition for De Novo Review filed by the State of Indiana, and commencing a hearing proceeding before an FCC Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) to resolve specific, 800 MHz rebanding disputes between Indiana and Sprint Corporation (Sprint). These issues reportedly relate to the costs to be reconciled as part of the closing of the Parties’ Frequency Reconfiguration Agreement (FRA). In 2004, the FCC directed that Sprint provide public safety licensees with comparable facilities on their new 800 MHz channels, and a seamless transition to enable public safety operations to continue without interruption during the relocation process. Public safety and other licensees using similar technology were obligated to have their 800 MHz systems rebanded at minimum reasonable cost. The rebanding plan contemplated that Sprint would negotiate an FRA with each licensee whose system was slated to be relocated. Indiana and Sprint were unable to resolve disputed issues during mediation. Therefore, the 800 MHz Transition Administrator advised the FCC’s Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau that the parties were at an impasse in negotiating the costs to be reconciled as part of the closing of their FRA. The Bureau later issued an order deciding the disputed issues, and Indiana filed a timely petition full Commission. DeadlinesNOVEMBER 1: FCC FORM 499-Q, TELECOMMUNICATIONS REPORTING WORKSHEET. All telecommunications common carriers that expect to contribute more than $10,000 to federal Universal Service Fund (USF) support mechanisms must file this quarterly form. The FCC has modified this form in light of its decision to establish interim measures for USF contribution assessments. The form contains revenue information from the prior quarter plus projections for the next quarter. Form 499-Q relates only to USF contributions. It does not relate to the cost recovery mechanisms for the Telecommunications Relay Service (TRS) Fund, the North American Numbering Plan Administration (NANPA), and the shared costs of local number portability (LNP), which are covered in the annual Form 499-A that is due BloostonLaw Contacts: Gerry Duffy and Sal Taillefer. Calendar At-A-GlanceOctober November December
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Wireless Network Planners
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| LETTERS TO THE EDITOR |
Brad/Tom: I finally heard back from the board repair depot at CTDI, and the answer really wasn't unexpected. For CTDI, they have no way to repair. Looks like this will be a dead end, and the end of the road for this product eventually. Regards, Jim T. On Wednesday, October 18, 2017 2:52 PM, Sarah Hinkel <SHinkel@CTDI.COM> wrote: Jim, Sorry for the delay, I was hoping to have better news for you. Unfortunately, these are obsolete and not able to be repaired nor supported. Sarah Hinkel | Repair Support Supervisor From: Jim Taylor [mailto:ww2bom@sbcglobal.net] Sarah, We spoke on the phone yesterday afternoon about some boards from a Motorola paging transmitter known in the Field as a Nucleus I paging transmitter. There were 2 plug in modules (FRU's) in particular in this transmitter that when one of the 2 boards failed, the matched pair had to be returned to the factory for repair and alignment. It is my under standing that the high stability osc had to be factory set for simulcast operation to function correctly once the pair was returned to the field. I have photos of the model and s/n labels on these modules that were sent to me so that I could determine what they have. This is the information that I can see from the photos. It would appear that there are 2 different model number Exciter Modules, and probably the same for the SCM Module. I would however assume that the repair and calibration process is the same, or very similar. Either pair could be placed into a paging transmitter and function correctly, if, the pair was matched by it's unique ID number. If unmatched pairs were placed into the transmitter, the station would transmit, but a particular feature would not work, and the field needs that feature to function properly. The modules in question are as follows: Pair 1 Pair 2 Is CTDI able to repair and calibrate these modules ? Best Regards, Jim Taylor [Editor's note: If memory serves me correctly, these two modules were used in both the Nucleus I and the Nucleus II. The Nucleus I had a poor power supply, only rated for indoor use, and there were some problems with the mounting of the PA transistors. The Nucleus II was much improved. Thanks to Jim and Tom for their contributions. We will now consider this matter closed unless someone comes up with new information.] |
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| THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK |
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― Daryn Kagan |
| VIDEO OF THE WEEK |
Everyday People • Turnaround Arts • Playing For Change
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| Source: | YouTube | Playing For Change |
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