Communications

Analogue PMR (professional mobile radio) is still going strong and its use is growing despite the increased adoption of digital PMR, such as Tetra, according to radio comms specialist Tait Europe. “The belief held amongst a few in the mobile radio industry that analogue is dead is a misconception,” said Chris Moore, sales and marketing manager for Tait Europe. “In ...

A hybrid technology approach is going to be needed to enable mobile phone location to work everywhere and be accurate, according to speakers at the European Emergency Number Association 112 conference. Assisted-GPS (A-GPS) satellite-based location technology is considered by all to be the basic technology which will then be combined with another technology to provide the required accuracy in both ...

Cambridge-based Antenova has produced a five-band antenna for mobile phones. “We already have a quad-band antenna and managed to get some more bandwidth with a little trick,” company chief scientist Professor Simon Kingsley told Electronics Weekly. “In fact, we can do it two ways.” In one incarnation, the antenna covers the US 800MHz (AMPS) and 1,900MHz (PCS) mobile bands, plus ...

Although WiMAX presents a potential opportunity for wireless networking and broadband silicon suppliers, it is still too early for communications IC vendors to commit to this technology, according to an IDC study. Only niche opportunities will exist through 2008, said the analyst firm, because major service providers have yet to make a firm commitment to deploy WiMAX. IDC believes there ...

Contract manufacturer Solectron is hoping to gain European revenues from the market for networking equipment. Matti Virtanen, recently appointed president of Solectron EMEA, said: “Infrastructure areas of the wireless networking industry are definitely going to be the big growth areas. The portion of firms outsourcing manufacturing in this sector is small.” Virtanen said areas such as WiFi will become more ...

Enhanced data rates for Tetra digital radio will be the next step for the technology, with a target of rates ten times faster than currently possible. “In our opinion high speed data will be vital,” said Matti Peltola, v-p of professional mobile radio at Nokia, speaking at the Tetra World Congress in Vienna. “Customers are requesting it.” Current practical data ...

Agilent Technologies claims that its 90nm CMOS process will allow “hundreds” of high speed serdes channel on the one chip. The multi-channel serialiser/deserialiser (serdes) is seen as a key technology for broadband communications, and most notably in Fibre Channel and PCI Express bus systems. Typical Asics currently offer up to 128 channels per chip. “Our latest 90nm validated serdes core ...

O2 Airwave is confident of winning the Firelink contract to provide a national communications network for the fire and rescue services. “We’ve been shortlisted and are optimistic of winning the fire and ambulance services contract,” said Peter Richardson, managing director of O2 Airwave, speaking at the Tetra World Congress in Vienna. “We have to get this right. There’s no opportunity ...

Comms watchdog Ofcom has ended the ten year debate on breaking up BT’s phone network business. A structural break-up of BT, so its national phone network is run by an independent firm allowing access to all, has been firmly rejected by Ofcom. “We believe that equality of access can be achieved without the structural separation of BT,” said Ofcom as ...

Telecoms regulator Ofcom is recommending that new wireless spectrum allocation in the UK be decided by the market, rather than Government agencies. Following a series of consultations, a document published by the regulator today is intended to bring together its policies on spectrum trading and liberalisation. Spectrum trading in the UK is due to start next month. In its review of the civilian radio ...