The Mercury Communications Motorola Shaye Communications consortium known as Mercury Callpoint Ltd launched its Callpoint mobile communications telephone system in London yesterday, promising a genuinely nationwide service by Easter of next year, with 2,000 Callpoint lines installed and working by that time. Present at the announcement was the Department of Trade and Industry’s Consumer Affairs Minister Eric Forth, who described the event as the response by British industry to the challenge laid down by government. The base stations, which link the handsets to the main telephone network via an 864MHz-868MHz radio link, will be installed in all towns with a population of over 100,000 by the end of next year, with additional base stations in place at intervals of two to five miles along motorways and trunk roads between major towns; further base station sites will include main British Rail stations and Little Chef and Welcome Rest restaurants. Initially, the service is aimed at the estimated 5m people who spend at least 20% of their time away from the office, with a mass market following later on. All calls made in the UK will be charged at the same rate, regardless of distance, with the economy rate for calls made between 6.00pm to 7.30am Monday to Friday and all day Saturday and Sunday costing 10 pence per minute; the standard rate of 16 pence per minute will be payable during the working week between 1.00pm and 6.00pm; calls made at all other times will be charged at the peak rate of 20 pence per minute. The Shaye Communications-designed handsets will cost UKP200, with a connection charge of UKP20 and a monthly service charge of UKP8; alternatively, customers can pay a monthly rental charge of UKP20, which includes everything except calls made. In this way, Mercury Callpoint claims the service is significantly cheaper than existing forms of mobile communications, and competitive with the service provided by the ordinary network. The range of the base stations is put at 200 yards, with the link to the handsets provided by a completely non-directional antenna, so that users do not have to see the base stations, which are indicated by large blue-and-white triangles, as the call is being made. At present, 36 base stations are up and running to provide a limited trial service; in the next few days, another 500 will be ready for use, pending the nod from the British Approvals Board for Telecommunications on the handsets: this has been delayed mainly because they use the same frequency as a number of military applications. The consortium is talking to a number of potential outlets to decide how the handsets are to be distributed, including high-street stores and specialist communications retailers: at present, the handsets are available direct from Mercury Callpoint. It was also confirmed that the service would incorporate the international Common Air Interface standard, on which a decision is due to be made early next year.
