[GreenKeys] WU and EFJ

[Bob Camp]

Hi,

My relationship with this story is from the outside looking in. In the early
80's.

We were a supplier to EF Johnson and I would up in Waseca on a fairly
regular basis. In 1980 they had a fairly good line of two way radios. The
market was dominated by Motorola with a 50 to 90% share in the various
segments. GE Linchburg was number two in most segments. The title of number
three depended on who you listened to.

All this was before the AMPS trials in Chicago. The only way to go for
mobile phone service was clunky to say the least. Pretty much all suppliers
sold mobile phone gear but it was not a major piece of anybody's business.

Motorola was pouring MAJOR money into the cell phone base station at the
time with some but not as much money going into mobiles. Handsets were smoke
and mirrors at that point. As we now know Nokia and Erickson also were
putting a lot of money into the base station stuff as well.

The big deal on the base station end was the switching. None of the major
radio companies knew much about the switching end of things and (different
story) they spend a lot of money trying to figure it out.

The connection with WU made sense from the simple standpoint that WU
understood switching and networks. Maybe they weren't a big voice switch
outfit but they knew more about it than the radio companies did. What they
and guys like AT&T didn't much understand was the radio business.

The answer to the problem is obvious today, but wasn't back then. The radio
guys took forever to work out the switching stuff. The switching guys picked
up the radio end of things fairly quickly. The sales dollars on a base
station mostly go to switch gear and not to radios. If you sell both switch
and radio you are going to make a lot more money. All of this wasn't very
obvious back then.

On the basis of what was known at the time the marriage of EFJ and WU made
sense for both companies. If the combination could have produced a decent
cell base station plus switch they would still be around today. Consider
that Nokia wasn't even on *anybody's* radar back then and today they
dominate the industry. A lot of people had a shot at the crown if they had
done it right.

The gotcha of course was money. Taking a good idea and turning it into
working hardware is expensive. As far as I can tell they never put together
anything close to the kind of program that they should have. The result was
a series of products, but nothing that went anywhere.

In the middle of all this along came Airphone .... but that'll have to wait.

    Enjoy!

        Bob Camp
        KB8TQ