Ericsson Inc. won a victory of sorts recently when the interim standard for the common air interface of Project 25 was taken off IS status and sent back to committee.
“They tried to jam through this standard without giving consideration to our comments,” said Steve Montealegre, director of marketing programs and industry standards for Ericsson.
“They ignored the process rules. We challenged them and won in arbitration,” Montealegre said.
This is the latest action in an eight-year struggle between Ericsson and Project 25. In the late 1980s, the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials-International Inc. sought a single digital standard to which all U.S. public safety organizations could migrate.
It selected a Frequency Division Multiple Access system of Motorola Inc.’s, which was a reconfiguration of Motorola’s commercial Astro product. The technology then began to move through the standards process of the Telecommunications Industry Association.
Ericsson says the project is a monopoly for Motorola although numerous manufacturers such as E.F. Johnson Co. and Racal Communications Inc. have licensed the technology and announced intentions to build equipment and bid for contracts. Motorola is expected to dominate the infrastructure side of the business, some industry participants said.
To participate in the Project 25 market, Ericsson would have to license the technology from Motorola. Motorola dominates the U.S. two-way radio market. Ericsson’s share of the U.S. market is small compared to its position in other parts of the world.
Ericsson tried in 1993 to get APCO to sanction a second technology standard for Project 25 “for the sake of competition.” Ericsson is promoting the Enhanced Digital Access Communications System, EDACS, which uses Time Division Multiple Access technology. Montealegre said APCO refused; the association wants one standard.
Motorola says it is staying out of the TIA-Ericsson struggle.
“We don’t follow what Ericsson is doing. This is not our argument. The (Project 25) users will vote,” said Motorola’s Pat Sturmon.
In eight years, at least a dozen Project 25 standardization documents have been published by TIA as Bulletins, but only two were adopted as Interim Standards, which requires strong consensus. One document that had reached IS status was the common air interface for Project 25; it now goes back to a formulating group. TIA said in an announcement it is also withdrawing the Project 25 Trunking Procedures Bulletin from publication and sending it back to a formulating group as well.
Ericsson doesn’t like the characterization that it is sabotaging the Project 25 standardization process, preferring to say instead, “We support the goals and objectives of Project 25. We just don’t believe the specifics for Phase I fulfill or meet those goals laid out in 1989.”
The current APCO standard is “inferior to my EDACS,” Montealegre said. “We don’t believe in making an investment in an old product line that doesn’t have a path to the future. As time goes on, new people will look at this situation. We haven’t given up.”
Other organizations involved with APCO in creating Project 25 are the National Association of State Telecommunications Directors and the Federal Government Agencies group.
