Abstract
The increasing mobility of the workforce, combined with the rapid convergence of computer, communications, and consumer electronics technologies, has spurred the development of numerous new wireless communications products and services. Accelerating competition has vastly increased the number of technological options available to consumers to meet their needs for personal communications. Unfortunately, this increase in options has been accompanied by increased and undesirable complexities. Even for simple wireless voice communications, the average customer has to deal with multiple telephone numbers, roaming codes, and confusing pricing arrangement. Exacerbating the inherent difficulties in using individual wireless technologies is the lack of interoperability among these services. Existing wireline networks, with their ubiquity, seamless operations, and ease of use, have provided clear benchmarks for satisfying customers' basic personal communications needs. There are considerable potential benefits to be realized, in terms of increased investment efficiencies, reduced time to market and the ability to meet the individual needs of consumers more closely, through the increase in the level of cooperation among competing services and technologies.
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Boschulte, A.F. Personal communications networks: Competition, convergence, and cooperation. Int J Wireless Inf Networks 1, 77–82 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02106511
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02106511