• Can PHS work for the Latin American Market?
  
• How far is PHS toward becoming an international cordless standard?
  
• Is PHS on its way to becoming an obsolete technology?
  
• What is happening with PHS in Japan?

The First PHS Latin America Summit, PHS symposium organized by IBC Asia Limited (who also organized the PHS World Congress) and supported by PHS MoU Group, was held on March 11 and 12 in Miami, Florida, USA.
Addressing the opportunities in the vast market of Latin America...
The 2-day Summit was chaired by Mr. Martin Cooper, CEO and Chairman of ArrayComm Inc. and Ing. Graciela Piedras, who also spoke, and represented CITEL, Comision Interamericana de Telecommunicaciones. The Latin America operators attending the summit showed great interest in PHS technology for wireless local loop applications.
The opening address was given by Mr. Cooper, who addressed the issue that is on everyone’s minds these days. He gave an impressive update on the reality of PHS, both currently deployed, and trailblazing new markets such as Latin America.
The Latin American speakers updated the audience on the wireless opportunities in various markets such as Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Urguay, Colombia and others. Spectrum allocation was another important issue discussed especially in view of the current privatization of the telecoms sector there.
Distorted bad news about PHS operations in Japan has been circulating. Mr. Chika, General Manager of DDI Pocket, presented the facts about PHS public operations in Japan, and cleared up any doubts or misunderstandings participants’ may have had about PHS; The accumulated number of subscribers has shown a marginal decline in recent months, caused mainly by the PHS operators’ marketing policy of cutting off bad subscribers.
Subscriber “quality” is improving. Total communications time has increased despite fewer subscribers. The high-speed 32 kbit/s data transmission services, which are one of PHS’s advantages, started in April 1997 and have been gradually increasing usage. Nearly 10% of total communications is data transmission. There is no doubt that PHS public service operations in Japan are improving.
The other presentations touched on the issues of economic viability and value added services to be offered in PHS. The conclusion was that PHS is definitely a good technology, well worth considering for wireless local loop, for fast deployment of telephony services given the low tele-density rates in Latin America.
The audience actively participated in the discussions and especially the Latin operators present, who gave very good feedback on the situations in their individual markets.