Rural wireless carriers look to be gaining more attention as the Rural Telecommunications Group has reigned in its focus, changing its name to the Rural Wireless Association in a move to “better reflect the association’s mission and focus.”
RWA noted that the name change was based on “membership growth and advocacy success” that resulted in its board of directors moving forward with the name change. The former RTG announced last week its LTE Roaming initiative designed to offer roaming capabilities for rural operators. The initiative is launching with the help of rural operator Union Wireless and a half-dozen platform providers.
The newly acronymed RWA claims to be the only trade association dedicated to “serving rural wireless carriers with fewer than 100,000 subscribers,” perhaps digging at the Competitive Carriers Association, which itself also caters to a mostly rural wireless membership. However, CCA, which itself re-branded from the previous Rural Cellular Association, has in recent years welcomed two of the nation’s largest operators in Sprint and T-Mobile US. That divergence in membership seemed to show itself at times during this week’s CCA trade show where some of the larger members professed much different ideas on select regulatory topics than their fellow members.
In addition to the name change, RWA also announced the election to its board of directors of DTC Communications CEO Craig Gates and Sagebrush CEO and GM Michael Kilgore. They will be joining re-elected board members Shawn Hanson, CEO and GM of Panhandle Telephone Coop, and Andrew Silberstein, VP and GM of Globecomm.
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