Next Revolution a Wireless One

With more than 2 billion people expected to have cellular phones and an anticipated 250 million Internet users by the year 2004, the next information revolution will undoubtedly be a wireless one, says AT&T Chief Executive C. Michael Armstrong in his Wednesday Convergence keynote address.

Mr. Armstrong tells conference attendees that the growth cycle of the Internet, with more than 100 million current users, has been drastically shorter than that of TV or radio. AT&T, Mr. Armstrong says, is working with three players in the automotive industry to develop global Internet Protocol (IP) backbone networks in order to facilitate wireless in-vehicle communications: General Motors Corp., Mercedes-Benz and the Automotive Network Exchange (ANX).

AT&T has invested heavily over the past two or three years in digital telematics, and Mr. Armstrong points out that 87% of the company's networks are now digital wireless, vs. the industry average of 55%.