Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Nextel keeps moving on push-to-talk

From: Marcelrf <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 22 Mar 2004 13:28:53 -0500

Nextel keeps moving on push-to-talk
Company plans to add data services, expand internationally
 
By Stephen Lawson, IDG News Service March 22, 2004   
 
ATLANTA - Nextel Communications Inc. isn't waiting for more mobile 
operators to roll out would-be competitors to Direct Connect, the 
pioneering "push-to-talk" service that lets subscribers talk 
instantly to friends and associates. It's charging ahead to extend 
that service and its capabilities. 

Plans include expanding the service internationally through its 
Nextel Worldwide service, adding data services to it and linking the 
QChat system for CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) and Wideband 
CDMA (WCDMA) to Nextel's iDEN network, Nextel executives said at a 
press briefing in Atlanta on the eve of the CTIA Wireless trade show. 

"We really are the experts at this," said Barry West, Nextel's 
executive vice president and chief technology officer. The Reston, 
Virginia-based carrier has about 10 years experience with the 
technology and 90 percent of its customers use it, West said. 

Push-to-talk technology lets subscribers make instant calls to 
contacts who are Nextel subscribers just by pushing a button on the 
phone. Following Nextel's success, other carriers, including Verizon 
Wireless Inc. and Sprint Corp.'s Sprint PCS Group in the U.S., are 
now coming out with similar services. European service providers are 
expected to follow suit. But Nextel isn't standing still. 

Direct Connect is set to hit the streets this year in Canada, Brazil, 
Argentina, Peru and the parts of Mexico that don't have access to it 
already, West said. Today it is available only in the U.S. and major 
Mexican cities. Pricing has not yet been set, but subscribers 
probably will pay a premium to make international Direct Connect 
calls, executives said. A new data service called "NextMail" allows 
subscribers to use the push-to-talk system to dictate e-mail 
messages, said Greg Santoro, vice president of Internet and wireless 
services. 

Nextel also is working on gateways between the QChat push-to-talk 
service and Nextel's iDEN network, in order to allow instant calls 
between iDEN users and CDMA and WCDMA networks worldwide. QChat will 
be demonstrated at CTIA Wireless, which runs Monday through Thursday. 

Nextel is also starting to introduce a handset-to-handset push-to-
talk capability that lets users keep communicating even if the 
cellular network goes down, Santoro said. This capability may be 
critical for public safety employees in emergencies, he said. 

The briefing by several executives covered a wide range of topics, 
including future product and network plans and expansion of the 
company's consumer-oriented Boost Mobile service. 

Nextel plans to introduce camera phones and MMS (Multimedia Messaging 
Service) capabilities this year, they said. The company sees its 
business customers using MMS to send audio and video files to and 
from phones, Santoro said. 

The carrier will deploy a faster mobile data capability in the fourth 
quarter of this year by "ganging" four iDEN channels together using a 
technology it calls WiDEN. It can deliver speeds of 60K bps (bits per 
second) to 80K bps, West said. 

However, "this isn't really broadband," West said. For that, Nextel 
is testing a wireless technology from Flarion Technologies Inc. in 
Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina. West sees it delivering 1.5M bps to 
3M bps downstream and 200K bps to 500K bps upstream to stationary or 
mobile users, representing a true competitor to DSL (Digital 
Subscriber Line) and cable modem service. 

Boost Mobile, a pay-as-you-go service now offered only in California 
and Nevada, will soon expand to seven new markets, including the New 
York-New Jersey-Connecticut area, Washington, D.C., Florida and 
Texas. Boost has proved very successful among African-American and 
Hispanic youths in urban areas, the executives said. 

 http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/03/22/HNnextelmoving_1.html

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