Word: wireless
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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BUSINESS: AT&T's High Wireless...
...announced it would acquire McCaw Cellular Communications, the nation's largest cellular-telephone company, for $12.6 billion. The pending deal has prompted antitrust concerns as Ma Bell hopes to stake its place in the booming wireless communications business, bypassing the Baby Bell systems that now handle cellular calls...
...cost of McCaw's visionary expansion is a staggering debt load of nearly $5 billion and losses of $715 million in the past two years. Even with that burden, McCaw is expected to play a crucial role in AT&T's quest to conquer the emerging field of wireless communications. Almost all calls now originate or terminate on conventional wall-jack telephones (even if they are cordless within the home). But analysts predict that cellular-type phones will gradually replace hard-wired sets. That could mean trouble for local telephone companies, whose monopoly depends on phones remaining tied down...
Previous computer-telephone mergers, such as IBM-Rolm, have been unsuccessful, but AT&T has managed to integrate the two businesses. In fact, there are now some 250 ongoing projects involving NCR and AT&T units, focusing on such crucial areas as messaging, network computing, wireless communications and desktop video. The merged companies, for instance, are developing a cash machine that identifies customers by voice rather than by a numerical code punched on a keypad. NCR has been given the key to the famed Bell Laboratories research center. Says Stead: "It's like a kid being let loose...
...group is also exploring less conventional means for attacking cultural complacency. Attracting lots of attention this past Arts First weekend, Agitprop staged a "multi-media extravaganza." Cheerleaders, the Parliamentary Speech and Debate Society. The South Asian Dance Company, and the Wireless Club took turns on stage while the Texas Club grilled up grub for passers-by and Fat Day, the only mobile band at Harvard, trooped around campus for four hours. Agitprop also organized several "tableaux vivant" of masterworks on the steps of Widener, including Raphael's "The School of Athens" and Rodin's "The Thinker" and "The Kiss." Plans...