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Editor’s letter

Mission statement

Land Mobile informs the complete wireless communications for business buying chain in the UK – all the way from the manufacturer to the end user.

As the leading monthly magazine for wireless communications for business, we are commi ed to providing our readers with the knowledge they need to procure the technology and services that best meet their requirements. We do this through accurate, timely and thorough reporting of best practice, new products, industry trends and regulatory changes.

We recognise that innovation knows no borders, and neither do we in our hunt for the most cu ingedge technologies and their deployment. Whether it be in print, online, or through our social media channels, we act as a hub through which key decision makers in the industry can reach out to each other.

This market would be nothing without its people and we give them a platform to voice their concerns and share their extensive experience. We promise to tell your story honestly and without bias and to champion your interests.

4

MWC hits the buffers

The after-effects of the shocking, but surely inevitable, decision to cancel this year’s Mobile World Congress are still resonating around the telecommunications industry. The hit to the GSMA, exhibitors and the city of Barcelona will be painful, not just in terms of the show, but to the potential revenue-generating possibilities and contacts MWC can bring.

The big vendors will lick their wounds and, as several have already indicated, replace MWC with smaller local roadshows. Perhaps hardest hit will be the smaller vendors and start-ups for which MWC claims a substantial share of their limited marketing budget, not to mention the chance of showcasing their solutions in front of a quality audience they won’t easily encounter elsewhere.

“Perhaps hardest hit will be the smaller vendors and start-ups”

In this issue, we interview Cradlepoint CEO George Mulhern (pages 10-12) to find out about the coming hyper-connected world with networks connecting millions of additional endpoints, cloudenabled platforms, automation and SD-WANs.

Unified communications have been talked about for the last two decades, but it is only in the past few years that new solutions have really been able to seamlessly combine multiple technologies and applications. Our feature on pages 13-15 looks at some of the most recent developments and how they might evolve further. We also talk to Simon Frumkin, CEO of the Freshwave Group (pages 1617), about the company’s ambitious plans to help overcome the cellular connectivity challenge, in particular for businesses indoors and for MNOs outdoors.

The government has big plans to drive the use of technology in education. Budgets in the state sector are always a problem, but Wi-Fi is hugely popular from primary school to university, while two-way radio and increasingly PoC are being used for voice comms (see pages 18-20).

Finally, we take a look at the often overlooked, but still important, world of maintenance contracts for two-way radio systems, on pages 21-23. The right maintenance partner with the right contract keeps radio networks working, allowing the user organisation to concentrate on its business.

James Atkinson, Editor

February 2020 | www.landmobile.co.uk | Twitter:@Land_Mobile