The US National telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has released two reports from its recent on-site prison cellular jamming trials at the Cumberland, Md. federal correctional facility in February. TR-10-466 Emission Measurments of a Cellular and PCS jammer at a Prison Facility – http://www.ntia.doc.gov/osmhome/contrabandcellphones/NTIAPrisoncelljammerreport_TR_10_466.pdf 10-468 Inital Assessment of the potential impact from a jamming transmitter [...]

Cell phone companies have started to barrage consumers with advertising for the next advance in wireless network technology: “4G” access. The companies are promising faster speeds and the thrill of being the first on the block to use a new acronym. Much of this is just marketing spin to promote systems that in some cases [...]

­The European Commission has adopted a decision establishing harmonized technical rules for Member States on the allocation of radio frequencies in the 800 MHz band that contribute to the deployment of high-speed wireless internet services by avoiding harmful interference. In several Member States the 800 MHz frequencies are being freed up as part of the [...]

Release 10 of 3GPP specifications will include LTE Advanced. Although some wireless/cellular operators and vendors have already been using the term “4G” for their LTE and WiMAX services, the “true” specifications for 4G services developed by standards organization 3GPP  will be published in March 2011 under Release 10, according to current targets. Read more of [...]

Following an advertising battle between AT&Ts and Verizon, with each claiming to have better coverage,  independent testing firm Root Wireless claims AT&T’s mobile data network problems compared to Verizon’s are mainly problems of perception. Testing shows AT&T 3G network outperforming VZW Dec 4, 2009 5:28 PM, By Kevin Fitchard AT&T (NYSE:T) and Verizon Wireless’ (NYSE:VZ, [...]

Huawei allies technology with price in battle with vendors By Gustav Sandstrom, Dow Jones Newswires Monday 30 November 2009 Chinese vendor’s improving portfolio to pose fresh challenge to European heavyweights. Chinese network equipment vendor Huawei’s challenge to European rivals has largely focused on its pricing advantage, but industry experts say it now has another key [...]

Earlier this week I noticed an article “Govt Calls for shared Network Towers” in the news. Cambodia’s Minister of Posts and Telecommunications called on the country’s nine mobile phone networks to share their network infrastructure to reduce the number of towers being deployed in the country. Requests to reduce tower numbers are becoming more common, [...]

Leading operators, network equipment vendors and handset developers have agreed on a common method for handling voice and SMS traffic over LTE.  Although LTE networks are likely to be primarily marketed as high speed data networks, it has become clear that they will still need to be able to carry voice and SMS traffic, and [...]

The Global Mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) today published its latest GSM/3G Market Update. Amongst the issues reported this month, GSA has confirmed that 300 WCDMA networks have been commercially launched in 126 countries. WCDMA has achieved approaching 75% market share of commercial 3G networks with an estimated 410+ million subscriptions. GSA says that 95% of [...]

The European Union in a decision this week formally approved the use of 3G and eventually 4G data on the 900MHz and 1800MHz GSM bands. The measure substantially improves the amount of bandwidth available for cellular Internet access in EU states and should render it less expensive as well. Besides reducing the need for more [...]