Hotels Go Wireless
Goli Ameri , a telecommunications consultant with Portland-based eTinium, said her research has found that about 2 percent to 3 percent of customers use the service at WiFi-enabled hotels. "To break even, you need 5 percent usage," she said. "If that usage is not there today, it will be there in six to 12 months." Hotel Lucia, which has provided WiFi since May, reports a 5 percent usage rate.
The Oregonian
December 16, 2002

Tut Systems will acquire Tektronix unit VideoTele.com for $7 million
Since telecommunications deregulation in 1996, companies have promised "convergence," in which telecommunications companies offer phone, Internet and television service in one package. Cable companies have succeeded in offering all of those services in many markets, but phone companies have been slower. "VDSL is just one of those things that's been put on the back burner," said Goli Ameri, president of eTinium, a Portland telecommunications consulting firm. "We've been talking for years about this video to the home through the telephone lines, and it's just really not happening."
The Oregonian
October 29, 2002

The three Ps of marketing
If you're a telecom equipment vendor wandering the frozen telecom tundra, the three Ps of marketing could be the most powerful tool you have in the battle between survival and extinction. These precious golden nuggets are "packaging," "positioning" and "presenting" your product to the target market with the ultimate goal of gaining a sale and showing revenues.
Telephony
October 25, 2002

The three Ps of marketing
If you're a telecom equipment vendor wandering the frozen telecom tundra, the three Ps of marketing could be the most powerful tool you have in the battle between survival and extinction.
Telephony
October 25, 2002

Will 3G Have To Compete For The Wireless Future?
Goli Ameri, President of eTinium Inc. (www.etinium.net), observes that European and Asian service providers have actively pursued the WLAN option. They recognize that part of the revenue that would have gone to the 3G network will be diverted to WLAN networks. According to Ameri, “British Telecom has a strategy to establish 4000 hot spots throughout the next year. Sonera and Telia have both been very active in this area as well.'
Wireless System Design
October 1, 2002

The final word on the crash of the telecom market
Michael Porter, the famed marketing guru, has said: "As an industry matures, the strategic sloppiness of its constituents is eventually revealed." For the telecom market, there is no more apt analogy than this powerful phrase, and its constituents range from governments to service providers, venture capitalists and vendors.
Telephony
August 26, 2002

Wireless channel use sets up turf battle
The world's biggest barista and a grass-roots group are squaring off in a wireless game of chicken at Pioneer Courthouse Square. "The nationwide access makes T-Mobile more attractive to many, especially business travelers. Paid services fill a need that groups such as Personal Telco cannot because of the wider coverage. These community-based wireless networks are wonderful, but these will never take the place of actual wireless systems deployed by carriers or companies such as T-Mobile," Ameri said.
The Oregonian
August 19, 2002

Telecom failures fraying some customer nerves
Goli Ameri, president of eTinium Inc., points out that "Both Qwest and WorldCom have a great deal of service and technology depth," said Ameri. These companies' financial troubles should not affect the status quo for at least the next six to 12 months. Ameri also said that the current situation of WorldCom and Qwest reminds her of the government bailout of Chrysler in the 1980s. "There was too much at stake for customers, the government and the industry as a whole to allow [Chrysler] companies to totally fail," she said, hinting at other possible solutions for WorldCom and other struggling telcos.
Portland Business Journal
July 26, 2002

Bluetooth Backers OK with '06 Adoption Estimates
Similar to the growing pains still plaguing next-generation wireless services, the long-term promise of Bluetooth technology has been overshadowed by what it can provide short-term and the development work needed to extract that potential. This has led to increasing frustration and differences...
RCR Wireless News
July 15, 2002

Worried about the demise of the start-up multiservice switch vendors? Look again, they are smarter than you think!
The situation of the start-ups is precarious, and the industry as a whole is trapped between a desire for new technology and an understandable need for stability. In addition, the RBOCs have the additional misgiving that maybe, just maybe, their most trusted vendors like Lucent may not be around to support their networks in the future, and hence they need to be given a helping hand today. However it seems as if the Darwinian rules of survival have joined hands with the closed-door maneuverings of the political conventions of the '40s to define the rules for start-up survival.

Telephony
July 3, 2002

XtremeSpectrum unveils UWB chipset
Compared with Bluetooth, which is still trying to find its niche in the marketplace after years of development, UWB offers approximately 100 times the potential throughput with only four times the power consumption. And when compared with 802.11-based technologies, UWB can offer between two and ten times the throughput at lower power consumption levels. "UWB (Ultra-wideband spectrum) might in fact end up being what HomeRF would have been in the home market, but lost the battle to 802.11b," said Goli Ameri, president of eTinium Inc.
RCR News
June 24, 2002

Integra expects to grow despite ATG rejection
[Integra Telecom] reached the cash-flow positive status by avoiding high capital costs, said Dudley Slater, Integra's chief executive officer. "We've just focused on the Northwest, Rocky Mountains and upper Midwest," Slater said. "We did not choose to expand nationally, and we did not take on an excessive amount of debt." That has set Integra apart from other failed telecommunications upstarts, said Goli Ameri, president of eTinium, a Portland telecommunications consulting firm. "They started small, and they're building their business the old-fashioned way," she said.
The Oregonian
June 14, 2002

Seamless mobility: A real trend
If any doubts remain within the wireless industry that a powerful trend toward seamless mobility exists, CTIA 2002 has put those to rest. The strong presence of wireless LAN products and solutions, the high attendance at the wireless LAN session (I was on the panel and saw it firsthand), not to mention highly visible "keynote addresses" on the topic by heavyweights such as Sky Dayton of Boingo and John Stanton of VoiceStream at an industry convention dedicated to cellular-oriented products firmly planted the stake.
Telephony
April 26, 2002

Can McLeod Beat the Odds
Goli Ameri, president of consultancy eTinium, believes that both the investment and the loan prove that Forstmann, Little isn’t about to let McLeod fail. "[Forstmann, Little CEO] Ted Forstmann has called in every favor he can to keep this company afloat, which is pretty much what he did with XO [Communications]," she said. "He’s convinced the stockholders and bondholders to take 25 cents on the dollar and accept the deal, he’s convinced the banks to cut back McLeod’s $1.3 billion loan to $425 million and he’s managed to land them a new credit facility, and he’s ponied up an extra $175 million."
America's Network
April 19, 2002

Can McLeod beat the odds?
Goli Ameri, president of consultancy eTinium, believes that both the investment and the loan prove that Forstmann, Little isn’t about to let McLeod fail. "[Forstmann, Little CEO] Ted Forstmann has called in every favor he can to keep this company afloat, which is pretty much what he did with XO [Communications]," she said. "He’s convinced the stockholders and bondholders to take 25 cewnts on the dollar and accept the deal, he’s convinced the banks to cut back McLeod’s $1.3 billion loan to $425 million and he’s managed to land them a new credit facility, and he’s ponied up an extra $175 million."
Americas Network
April 19, 2002

Merger has nice ring for wireless firms
"In this market right now, any move is going to be looked at as too bold a move," said Goli Ameri, an analyst with eTinium, a Portland research company. In six months, a year, first or second quarter of 2003, I could see some consolidation happening. But right now, it's one of those typical industry hypes."
Seattle Times
April 15, 2002

High-speed wireless makes Portland debut
Verizon Wireless on Tuesday announced it is providing Portland's first "3G," or third-generation, high-speed wireless Internet service. [The connection is fast]..but it's still much slower than land-line broadband connections -- digital subscriber lines and cable modems. And many experts say it isn't 3G. "I don't understand why they position it that way," said Goli Ameri, president of eTinium, a Portland telecommunications consulting firm. A true 3G network, Ameri said, is much faster than what Verizon turned on in Portland."
Oregonian
April 10, 2002

CTIA 2002: VoiceStream connecting firm's future to Wi-Fi
Interest in Wi-Fi, short for wireless fidelity, also known as 802.11, has soared in the past year. Unlike the vast wireless networks of carriers such as VoiceStream and Redmond's AT&T Wireless, Wi-Fi runs on unlicensed airwaves, avoiding huge licensing costs. "The financial windfall is not clear," said Goli Ameri, president of Portland market-research firm eTinium. "(But) the way of the future is seamless mobility. Who can provide this? The wireless-service providers are in the best position."
Seattle Times
March 25, 2002

Carriers eye seamless WLAN, cellular integration
With WLAN systems growing in popularity and 3G technologies struggling, some in the wireless sector feel that 802.11b WLAN systems provide a better option for delivering wireless Internet access. "WLANs will be a nemesis for 3G networks," said Goli Ameri, president of research firm eTinium Inc., during a panel session Monday at the CTIA Wireless 2002 trade show. "The business case for 3G is not as solid as it once was. And WLANs are going to be ubiquitous," Ameri said. For that reason, wireless LANs pose a real threat to wireless carriers, she said.
CommsDesign
March 19, 2002

Broadband: it's more than a phone call away
There is still no consensus in the telecom industry about how universal broadband should best be achieved. CLECs eagerly entered the telecom market to challenge Baby Bells. Local CLECs include GST, now defunct; Electric Lightwave, which is struggling; Integra Telecom and New Edge Networks, which are holding on. "The RBOCs are the winners" in the standoff between the two classes of phone companies, said Goli Ameri, president of eTinium, a telecom consulting and market research firm in Portland.
Portland Business Journal
March 15, 2002

Hospitality Checks Out Wireless
If the current activity among U.S. hotels is any indication, road-weary travelers may one day be settling more quickly into their rooms, which they might have booked on a PDA, and hotels could be operating more efficiently. New wireless applications promise to take the tedium out of registration and give hotels an opportunity to sell ancillary services, like a round of golf or a massage. “This is catching on for a simple reason: It offers guests a real convenience,” says Goli Ameri, president of IT consulting firm eTinium. “The concept is to bring the service where the guest is".
mbusinessdaily
March 1, 2002

Customers: Friend or Foe?
The bandwidth glut, high prices, immature technology, inadequate implementation of the Telecom Act and the anemic capital markets have all been cited as the culprits for the recent demise of the telecom market. What we rarely hear about, however, are service providers' sub-par services to their customers. At eTinium, we conducted some random interviews with small businesses and consumers. Our interviews clearly point to the fact that all are suffering from an acute case of customer neglect.
Telephony
The Analyst's Corner
February 22, 2002

An Appetite For Risk
Enron thrived on risk. So did a mass of companies, from telecom superstar Global Crossing to doughnut dominator Krispe Kreme. "When you have a low-margin product like fiber-optic capacity, you need to have to have a large volume," said Goli Ameri, president of eTinium, a Portland telecommunications consulting firm. But that demand for capacity dwindled as lenders and investors became more tight-fisted and improved technology reduced the need for fiber optic cables, said Vik Grover, a telecommunications analyst at Kaufman Bros. in New York.
The Oregonian
February 17, 2002