Nextel improves push-to-talk.

NEXTEL IS ADDING COOL new features to Direct Connect, its industry-leading push-to-talk (PTT) service. PTT lets users connect with a quick push of a button, much like a two-way radio--no dialing, no ringing, no waiting.

Push-to-talk is attractive to users because of the speed, and because wireless carriers charge less for the more-efficient PTT minutes. That's good for the customer, and also good for Nextel, which has built the most loyal and highest spending customer base in the mobile phone industry.

Competing carriers including AT&T Wireless, Cingular, Sprint PCS, T-Mobile, and Verizon have announced push-to-talk rollouts, but none are fully deployed. Nextel's proprietary iDEN network was built for PTT, so there's only a brief delay when connecting (known as latency), usually one half to three quarters of a second. The other carriers are adding PTT to network that weren't designed for it, so connection delays are an issue. Some reports put these PTT connection times at two to four seconds, a gap too disruptive for natural conversation.

It appears that GSM carriers are in a better position to implement PTT than their CDMA counterparts for a couple of reasons. "With respect to push-to-talk, there are some routing issues to handle with CDMA," says Ken Hyers, senior analyst with research company In-Stat/MDR. "There are also problems overcoming latency." Also, it's unlikely there will be a CDMA standard as there will be for GSM. Several companies are working with the basic Qualcomm CDMA standard, but then go their separate ways.

While the other carriers work to get push-to-talk deployed, Nextel is rolling out nationwide Direct Connect. A Nextel user should get the same performance whether connecting to a user across town or across the country. Nextel expects to provide Direct Connect throughout all its service areas in the U.S., including Hawaii, by the third quarter of 2003.

Next on the Nextel agenda is to use satellites to deploy Direct Connect globally. "This has enormous appeal to our friends in government/public safety--our fastest growing market segment," says Tom Donahue, Nextel president and CEO. He also says Nextel is working to improve Direct Connect voice quality. Other plans include push-to-view functionality to take advantage of phones that contain cameras, and Web-based directories to help companies set up dynamic talk groups.