Verizon Sues Nextel For Espionage

jonknee writes "Verizon is going after Nextel for a little corporate espionage. Verizon says that Nextel got its hands on some internal prototypes of models aimed to compete with Nextel's Direct Connect technology. Verizon's service is slotted to start up anytime, and a few other carriers are expected to launch similar services."

Comments

Actually its Sprint PCS

[dankinit]

Actually the article says Sprint PCS, not Verizon's push to talk service is expected to go live soon.

Re:who needs direct connect?

[Genjurosan]

Direct Connect is great! Fast to get the person you want, it uses a queuing system to get the persons attention, you have the option of simply starting to talk (much like the god scenario in weird science), and the best thing... No one can interrupt you while you are talking to them! HA! Unfortunately, it's works both ways.

Re:Verizon Service + Number Portability = Competit

[Genjurosan]

Sure they could switch over, but they would all have to get NEW phones. IDEN is unique to Nextel phones. I pay a pretty high $70 a month for my nextel phone, but I had 3000+ incoming minutes last month during PEAK usage hours and didn't pay a dime extra. Reason: I have a free-incoming plan with Nextel.

Re:Direct Connect

[LloydSeve]

Looking at the page I don't see any trademark or
copyright information or markings anywhere.

But in any case, it is actually referred to as
Push-To-Talk or PTT, and Direct Connect is how
it is referred to.

Re:Verizon Service + Number Portability = Competit

[erpbridge]

I agree about the one-way Direct Connect problem. Although, if you think about it, a two-way version is also known as a phone (and Nextel's with DC can function as speakerphones with the built in speaker). I still think it would be a nice capability to build in full-duplex into DC functionality as well.

There is one way around the waiting for someone to stop talking that I have found. At least on my I-80, whenever someone is talking to you over Direct Connect, the "Exit" option is still active on screen. If you press that, it forces a disconnect (and gives an annoying beep on the other end, analogous to the "person busy" error.) Then you can talk to them, or do whatever.

What exactly (legally) is being alledged here

[hillct]

Verizon wilreless uses standard cell hardware available for license by many service providers in the U.S. and internationally, so exactly what is being alledged here? Is it that Nextel entered into a contract with the same hardware manufacturer that Verizon was going to use in providing a competing service, or is it that Nextel aquired hardware from such a manufacturer when that hardware was exclusively developed for/licensed to Verizon. The article is vary sketchy about this rather important detail.

--CTH

Re:Now this would make sense..

[nvrrobx]

Ahh, but Verizon DOES have a global impact!

Ever hear of Vodafone?

To quote Verizon's "About Us" page:

Vodafone is the world's largest mobile operator with over 112.5m proportionate customers worldwide and equity interests in 28 countries and Partner Networks in a further 7 countries.

I work for Nextel

[armyturtle]

I can tell you first hand that Nextel would never do such a thing as this. I finished taking a company required moral ethics class via the net (class has been a requirement for employees for years now) that deals with instances EXACTLY as this one. Sure, an individual employee may have gained unauthorized access at some point, but Nextel would have fired the guy immediately and turned over any information/equipment, etc. to Verizon. There's not a chance in hell they would have used it to gain an advantage. As stated by another /.'er, they have no reason to do this; Their Direct Connect/Walkie Talkie has been perfected over 11 years and it now works from coast to coast (soon to be international as well). So what's the reason for Verizon filing suit? They probably heard a Nextel company executive at some point say that they believe Verizon's PTT like service will not live up to Nextel's. But here's the real reason: http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/030620/205239_1.html You see, on June 20th, Nextel had multiple trademarks approved by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The following trade marks (TM) belong to Nextel: PTT, Push To Talk, Push Power, and Nationwide Walkie Talkie (there may be others I'm not aware of). Now this is a REAL PROBLEM for Verizon who needs to describe their "walkie-talkie" like service somehow. They need a name for it, and a catchy one at that. Nextel had a hell of a time getting consumers to understand what "Direct Connect" is. It wasn't until switching to using the term "Walkie-Talkie" that they found it clicked immediately what the service was. Everyone knows what a walkie-talkie is. So it is my opinion that Verizon filed suit over some bogus claim in retaliation to Nextel having their trademarks approved. If Verizon doesn't find a good name for their product and can't any decent terms to describe it (must sum up the meaning in one to three words to catch people's attention) their service will have an extremely difficult time launching. How are you going to convice consumers they should add another charge/service to their phones if you can't adequately explain what it is/does without calling it a walkie talkie, ptt or push to talk service?

Re:Prior Art : PTT

[DigitalJEM]

I think everyone is using the wrong term, including the media. They gained a SERVICE MARK (SM) not a TradeMark (TM). Service Marks are used to describe a service that a provider offers. This would make it impossible for other cellular companies to use the terms they registered. It would not make it illegal for ham radios, cb's, two way radios (truned or FRS), etc etc etc to use the term as they are not in the same "business" as a cellular provider is. It only entails to competition. And I feel that Nextel only got the registration so that they could keep the other cellular companies from using "their" terms. I hardly doubt they would go after the other people that use it as that would just raise one massive uproar and a whole heap of *blah*..

Re:I N T E R O P E R A B I L I T Y

[armyturtle]

Direct Connect is NOT a two way radio. It works nothing like a two way radio. It only appears to work that way to the end user. Please don't state things you have no clue about. Direct Connect is a packet data communication that uses 6:1 interleving onto the network. Regular interconnect calls (phone calls) use 3:1 interleving and are as a result a much higher voice quality. Because Direct Connect (or Walkie Talkie) uses 6:1 interleving and is a half-duplex like connection it uses little to no network resources. The result is instantaneous conversation/connection with a very low cost without bogging the network down and thus allowing regular interconnect calls to go through without a hitch. For reference, anything wireless (data) you do on your Nextel phone is using 12:1 interleving. Sometime this year Nextel is releasing 6:1 interleving interconnect (normal phone) abilities. Even though it's 6:1 there will be no loss of voice quality due to a new vocoder chip (new algorithm) in the newer Nextel phones. The result of this is Nextel will instantaneously double its network capacity. So no, Direct Connect (PTT) is NOT like a two way radio. It still goes over the network as if it were a normal phone call, it's just interleaved onto the T1 frame at a much lower rate. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about in the term interleaving... it's refering to how and when and on what frames within the T1 the data is placed on. A Direct Connect (PTT) call gets chopped up into data packets and is placed on the T1 every 6th frame. Regular interconnect calls are placed on the T1 every 3rd frame (soon to be every 6th with no loss of quality) and data services (Packet Data, aka: PCH) is placed on the T1 every 12th frame.