Wireless, cellular, internet: instant constant telecommunications.

• Author: Stomierowski, Peg
• Position: SPECIAL SECTION: UTILITIES - Company overview

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Keeping up with technology perhaps in no field is more challenging than in the rough-and-tumble world of telecommunications; factor in those uniquely Alaska cost and access challenges, and it's never boring to be up front and center to rousing price and service action in this competitive arena.

As wireless cellular and long-distance prices continue to come down, telecom sources said, growing trends include greater wireless mobility, consumer volume, use of smart phones, diversity of handsets and affection for data transmission. Text messaging, once the language of the young, has proliferated no surprise to pop-culture buffs or students of our changing tongue.

WIRELESS MOBILITY

In Alaska, the telecom field hasn't been plagued with the same recessionary cutbacks seen in the Lower 48, GCI's David Morris observed. Since such larger providers as Sprint and Verizon don't have facilities here, many carriers locally buy Internet or cellular capacity from fiber-optic cable or satellite service providers.

Statistics from managers testify to the breadth of change in the industry: 87 percent wireless penetration of the U.S. population, with 20 percent of households now wireless only; 2.2 trillion annual minutes of wireless use; 1 trillion annual text messages; 242,000 cell sites; and 291,000 emergency calls every day.

Among many providers in Alaska, ACS, AT&T and GCI lay claim to local prowess in wireless cellular, Internet and other services. Others, like Matanuska Telephone Association in the Mat-Su and Eagle River valleys, also are working to build up services and customers.

Morris, when he came to the telecom field 16 years ago with a background in public relations, recalls being challenged at first to keep up. To illustrate, he noted that while 80 percent of telephone traffic today involves data the other 20 percent being voice in 1994, it was just the opposite.

Like others, ACS spokeswoman Heather Cavanaugh noted the dramatic shift toward greater wireless mobility. "We expect the trend toward mobility to accelerate as more and more applications for wireless phones become available," she said. "We are continuing to expand our device selection to include more data-rich devices, and understand that trends will continue to move toward higher data usage and away from voice minutes."

As Lianne Pelletier, president and CEO of ACS has reflected, in demanding greater mobility, consumers are moving beyond landlines and fixed Internet...