FCC Sets Aside Airwaves for Revolutionary Wireless Plan : Technology: PCS--personal communications services--could eventually be as portable and unobtrusive as a wristwatch.
The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday set aside airwaves for an eagerly awaited new service that will provide wireless data communications through devices that could eventually be as portable and unobtrusive as a wristwatch.
The unanimous FCC vote to launch “personal communications services,” or PCS, within the next 12 months is an important step toward a go-anywhere system of telecommunications in which users would have a single number they would carry with them wherever they go.
In another sign of change, licenses to provide PCS services will be among the first to be auctioned off, rather than allocated administratively the way earlier telecommunications licenses have been.
Acting FCC Chairman James H. Quello said the agency’s action will further stimulate telecommunications competition. He vowed that the FCC will pay special attention to the groundbreaking PCS technology, making sure it is “put on a very fast track.” He said the agency will begin awarding PCS licenses later this year.
The nascent PCS technology, which has been in the planning stages for three years, would be a boon to the estimated 14 million people who now use pagers or mobile data services. It is also a potential financial bonanza for the dozen-odd companies seeking to offer the technology.
Although initial service offerings will probably be limited to data transmission, PCS will eventually include advanced voice paging and facsimile transmission.
“With this decision, the Federal Communications Commission opened the way for our industry to bring a new range of services to the American public,” said Thomas A. Stroup, president of Washington-based Telocator, one of the companies seeking to offer PCS.
PCS would improve on current wireless services, such as cellular telephones, by permitting smaller and more portable devices capable of working inside buildings and at great distances, said Jai P. Bhagat, president of Jackson, Miss.-based MTel Technologies, one of the companies seeking to offer PCS.
“This will be the first nationwide, user-friendly data network,” Bhagat said.
He said that, unlike most current data and telecommunications systems, a caller would not need to know the location of an intended recipient. Each user would be assigned one PCS number and the network would automatically locate any of them.
MTel’s PCS network should also untether personal computers, letting them send and receive from anywhere without a telephone connection or modem. They would instead use a built-in microchip or credit card-size device designed to be inserted into an expansion slot.
Such a device would cost between $300 and $400, would be able to receive up to a full page of data per second and store up to 100 messages at a time.
Even after the FCC awards PCS licenses, winners will face some obstacles in erecting the new network. Bhagat estimates that his company alone will need to raise $100 million to build a PCS network and another $150 million in operating capital. In addition, cellular companies are developing a new network that will enable the current patchwork of local carriers to function as a homogenous nationwide network.
