It is time to choose RCR Wireless News’ 2002 Person of the Year. This year, RCR Wireless News, the sister print publication of GlobalWirelessNews.com, decided to let you voice an opinion in this process. Who do you think was the person who most influenced the industry in 2002? (Remember, influences are not necessarily positive.) Enter your vote via the poll question near the bottom left of the home page of GlobalWirelessNews.com.
There are a number of worthy candidates for this year’s choice. The RCR Wireless News and GlobalWirelessNews.com editorial staffs have selected five. Because this is our award and we need to be able to defend it, the edit staff still will have the final vote on the person of the year. But we thought a popular vote would be fun too. And we can still be influenced by our readers. Keep in mind, RCR Wireless News focuses on the U.S. wireless industry, which is why there is an obvious bias toward U.S. operators.
We will announce the winner later this year. The only rule is that past winners cannot be nominated. Past winners include: Morgan O’Brien (1993); Reed Hundt (1994); Wayne Schelle and Jay Bhagat (1995); Irwin Jacobs (1996); George Schmitt (1997); Dan Hesse (1998); Alain Rossmann (1999); Chris Gent (2000); Allen Salmasi (2001).
Below are this year’s candidates and brief summaries of why they were nominated:
Judge Catherine Blake, U.S. district judge in Baltimore. She had the power to turn the global industry on its ear if she had ruled that a U.S. class-action lawsuit alleging a connection between brain cancer and cell-phone use was allowed to go forward. But after judiciously looking at the facts, Blake ruled there is not enough evidence that cell-phone use is linked to brain cancer to let the case move forward-a huge win for industry.
Tim Donahue, Nextel chief executive. In one word, ARPU. Nextel is the only U.S. carrier to have successfully avoided cut-throat pricing wars that everyone agrees hurt the industry, but that no one else seems to be able to escape. Nextel also is looking smart for holding off on a 3G technology decision and has not had to make the huge financial investments that would have accompanied such a choice.
Jorma Ollila, Nokia chief executive. Nokia is the one vendor that has weathered the downturn the most favorably and is actually in a stronger position overall than it was during the boom times. The vendor has refocused on its handset business as the spending by operators for infrastructure has dried up. Microsoft poses the biggest threat to Nokia, and Nokia has made major inroads this year in that battle. The company was the driver behind the Open Mobile Alliance, which has grown to include all major players in the industry from content companies to IT companies to Microsoft itself.
John Stanton, T-Mobile USA chief executive. Stanton’s bold decision to integrate its existing network with 802.11b technology enables the carrier to take advantage of the past and the future in one swift move. Wireless LAN, no matter its life span, is the wave of the moment, and the person on top of it deserves the blame or accolade of its fortunes. T-Mobile also has been able to gain market share in a down year, despite changing its name and its spokeswoman. The carrier has been innovative in network sharing and embracing data with its HipTop pager launch.
Dennis Strigl, Verizon Wireless chief executive. Verizon, the nation’s largest carrier, is known as a conservative company, and that has served it well this year, especially in this downtrodden market. Verizon decided against spinning off its wireless division, which was a good move. Verizon also has been cautious in rolling out 3G services-another prudent decision in a soft economy. The carrier put significant money behind a wireless data marketing campaign. And Verizon should be commended for leading the fight to get re-auction pledges back from the government, a battle that helped a number of carriers.
