Carmen Nobel

Starbucks Corp. is aiming to let its customers get wireless Internet access while they get wired on the chains premium coffee. The Seattle-based coffee giant on Wednesday announced that the company has set up wireless LANs in 1,200 of its retail coffee shops and plans to have 2,000 cafes wirelessly hooked up by the end […]

Wireless carrier Nextel Communications Inc. on Wednesday announced its Wireless Business Solutions initiative, a combination of home-grown applications and partnerships with large systems integrators designed to woo corporate customers. “As a result of partnerships with IBM and [Electronic Data Systems] and Sun [Microsystems Inc.], new products are being created,” said Ernie Cormier, vice president of […]

To cut costs, Cingular Wireless is cutting both employees and calling plan minutes. The Atlanta-based wireless carrier on Tuesday said that it would lay off as many as 3,000 employees, a third of which will come from attrition and temporary positions. Many of the cuts will come from Cingulars sales department, which the company is […]

With the long-awaited WLAN security standard known as 802.11i hung up in the approval process, some vendors are moving ahead with their own security solutions. Symbol Technologies Inc., along with Intersil Corp., Intermec Technologies Corp., Microsoft Corp. and Cisco Systems Inc., have formed an ad hoc consortium to develop an interim solution known as SSN, […]

Research In Motion Ltd. on Monday announced that the company is working with the National Security Agency to support S/MIME (secure/multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) on the RIM BlackBerry wireless e-mail platform. RIM is providing NSA with a customized version of BlackBerry software with S/MIME support, said officials at RIM in Waterloo, Ontario. S/MIME is an […]

Wireless hardware manufacturer Symbol Technologies Inc. on Tuesday said that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating revenue the company reported in calendar 2001. The Holtsville, N.Y., company has produced documents in response to the SEC inquiries, according to an SEC filing that Symbol filed Tuesday. In addition, Symbol has launched its own investigations […]

Handheld computer maker Handspring Inc. on Tuesday announced it had appointed a new chief financial officer. William Slakey, 44, will take the CFO position on Sept. 30, according to officials at the Mountain View, Calif., company. Slakey most recently was CFO at WJ Communications Inc., a semiconductor company. Prior to that, Slakey was CFO at […]

Research in Motion Ltd. on Monday announced that its Blackberry wireless e-mail platform now includes the ability to view e-mail attachments on Blackberry pagers. The new application, based on the AirDoc platform from Arizan Corp., lets users select attachments from within an e-mail and view documents, spreadsheets, presentations and graphics files on their BlackBerry handhelds. […]

Flarion Technologies Inc., a spinoff of Lucent Technologies Inc., is teaming with a major U.S. government contractor to promote the idea of a wireless homeland security network. Northrup Grumman Corp.s IT sector is pushing to the companys customers the idea of a network based on Flarions flash OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) technology, which runs […]

Despite headline-grabbing features such as “Charlies Angels” ring tones and miniature phone cameras, Sprint PCS Groups new, third-generation network is focused on the enterprise, and vendors are lining up products and services to support the nationwide launch. In addition to Sprint PCS rollout this week of its 3G PCS Vision CDMA 1X network, the Overland […]

Danger Inc. on Tuesday announced several partnerships with application developers, but also said that its long-awaited Hiptop wireless device will be delayed once again. The Palo Alto, Calif., startup has delayed the launch several times. Initially the company planned to launch the phone/PDA/pager combo device at the end of 2001. But in February 2002, the […]

A new deal struck between Microsoft Corp. and AT&T Wireless last week could make it easier for companies to buy wireless equipment in the future. However, it is not likely to produce the enterprise application nirvana the two companies are promising, industry experts say. The two Redmond, Wash., companies last week announced a plan to […]