Memories of Cellular Communications. Part Two
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What do they think they are doing???
2008. Growth slowed down, but did not stop. Everything just became calm and controlled. There is no longer a task to break into the market and make it before others do. There is development, it improves coverage. There are plans for the quarter/year.
There is a plan to increase the subscriber base. Until now, everything was done due to the growth of this very base. Now operators are increasingly trying to cannibalize each other.
Mergers and acquisitions are underway. The big three are becoming more and more obvious. For now, a three, Tele2 will fully join them later.
The situation with personnel is returning to normal. Providers are still inflating and eating away at students, but even this is becoming a norm, not a shock. And providers are now growing in a more controlled and predictable manner. And in general – they are no longer upstarts with drills. Now they are full-fledged market players.
Engineers fall asleep, management wakes up. By the way, in this article I do not use the phrase “effective managers” in a negative way, rather just with irony. Because it was obvious – this cellular monster needs to be optimized, it swelled up like a bear after a bee sting. And some things are extremely redundant.
Let me give you some examples:
Not far from Chelyabinsk there is a settlement called Timiryazevsky. I saw a stunning picture there. Megafon, Beeline and MTS towers stand in a triangle, literally three hundred meters from each other. A little further away is a Skylink mast. And even further away rises a huge Rostelecom tower. This is complete nonsense and it is obvious that an abnormal situation has developed. The operators should either choose one and stand next to him. Or chip in for a common tower. But everything was built during the times of fierce competition and that's how it was built. You won't see anything like that now. That place is dismantled, and the operators calmly share towers with each other. And what towers – networks are shared! That is, there hangs an MTS antenna and distributes 4G to itself and Beeline on a different frequency.
The requirements for engineer qualifications have changed. Now it is absolutely clear what and how should be installed. What is the point of making an expensive engineer hang on a tower and hang an antenna? Or drag batteries from a truck? Obviously, it is possible… well, for starters, to give him cheap fitters to help. In the future – the main construction will be done by the contractor, and let the engineer come for commissioning.
This is what will happen, by the way. Looking at the contractors, I caught myself thinking HOW much cheaper these people are. There were always questions about their appearance, often smelled of fumes. They did not always do the work neatly. At some point, we even divided the field so that they would not immediately take on jobs that they could not handle.
And their gear. It's a horror. I understand, it's scary for us, white people. We were always bought excellent branded gear, our ladders were tested. And there they worked with what was left after the nuclear war.
This is probably going too far. But the fact remains – carrying batteries by hand by an engineer is expensive. In times of growth, fear for equipment, lack of understanding of pitfalls, this is what they did. Then they tried to get away from these excesses as much as possible.
Stricter standards. I remember the times when thick copper cable was a 100% consumable, as much as it could be unwound. Were you distracted, cut the wrong place? Bring another coil, it should work the second time.
Let's be honest – uncontrolled access to valuables creates space for abuse. Even if not direct theft, but a sloppy attitude to something that “the warehouse is full of”. And of all things, there is always plenty of copper in communications, in a variety of forms. Just look at the feeder – a high-frequency cable, three fingers thick. It is not all copper, there are two tubes – a core and a screen, they are copper. But even in scrap form it is still expensive.
The clouds are gathering. Everyone intuitively understands where this is all heading, but they hope that it will be okay. There is more and more talk about the third generation of cellular communications. “Someone has to build it too!”
I'm a communications specialist!!!
It's incredible. I was probably the first person in the world who was told “we'll call you back” when looking for a job. And they did! It was a great day. Or rather, it was ordinary at first. And then my future boss called me and asked if I was interested in this part-time position. Yes? Well, come by and write your application. Will you be able to start in August?
Yes Yes Yes!!!
For the next year and a half, I sat astride the switchboard and occasionally ventured out to the base stations. It just so happened that our duty shift managed to service the entire network of 32 stations throughout the region.
I absolutely loved my job. Young and inexperienced, I got 12 thousand right away. There is a salary, a bonus, an extra payment for night shifts. 12 thousand in 2006 is a normal salary for many. And for mine I came to 7 12-hour shifts a month. I had relevant experience. And I continued to study.
The shifts were different. On some there was nothing to do, after some you wanted to fall down and fall asleep right in the hallway. I didn't complain about anything and was happy with everything.
A year later I defended my bachelor's degree and went on to complete my studies to become an engineer.
Suddenly I realized that I really liked communications. Boring theory was a thing of the past, and practice turned out to be much more pleasant and understandable. We started taking specialized subjects, and my record book began to consist of only A's. I remember one teacher leafing through it for a long time before writing in his “excellent”. And he said: “I see, Plotnikov, you've come to your senses.”
In the winter of 2008, against the backdrop of a painful breakup, I decided to make some kind of breakthrough in my life.
I sent my resume to the main mobile operators. Skylink responded the fastest. There was no such thing as an offer back then, they simply offered me a salary and 18 thousand. With a heavy heart, I went to quit and explained that this was it, I was leaving.
I didn't even consider the possibility that they could offer me something. Who would need me like this, young, inexperienced [с профильной вышкой и профильным же опытом в полтора года, невысокими запросами, молодой и перспективный, уже обученный на текущем месте, уже доказавший, что не криворук, ага]. But I was asked a question – why are you going to Skylink? For a pay rise and salary increase? Well, here you have a pay rise and salary even higher than in Skylink. That's it? Are you staying? Oh well.
Now I called Skylink to apologize. My would-be boss said: “I would be surprised if they didn’t persuade you to stay. Probably not – if they let you go quietly, I would suspect something was wrong. But don’t worry, we all understand.”
This happened literally in two days. And then Beeline, Megafon, MTS, Tele2 started calling me. Everyone offered something, but I had already refused everyone. However, I realized that the market is still very, very far from being saturated with specialists.
Dreams of the Future
The crisis in the fall of 2008 hit like a blow to the head. There were signs saying “rent” everywhere, the dollar was soaring, and there was alarming uncertainty.
Communications, in general, withstood the blow. But something elusive changed. Here they dismantled another telephone exchange. And those who were not retired – they were fired. They were fired normally, according to the Labor Code, with all payments, without any hard feelings. But they were fired.
Prices were rising, but wages were not. People were quietly grumbling, but against the backdrop of layoffs in other industries, everyone understood that we were still lucky.
Development programs have not been stopped, but they have been cut. Standards have been cut. Some bonuses have been cancelled somewhere. In general, everything is starting to shrink.
Two turbulent years pass. Literally before the arrival of the third generation, GSM wins over CDMA. In Russia, all CDMA networks must be quickly closed down by the end of 2010. In 2011, Svyazinvest reassembles its assets under the flag of Rostelecom. The newly created Rostelecom first of all buys Skylink.
There is an obvious consolidation going on. This is both a saving and a problem for the employees. All the departments that duplicated each other are being merged and optimized. People are being fired in droves. Yes, the first to be fired are the administrative staff, but every now and then some engineer is optimized. There is anxiety and hope in the air. The third generation is already close. They are already designing. They are already piloting. They have already started building somewhere. And it is just around the corner… Maybe it will work out, it will pass and the big construction will begin again? And the construction has begun… But not in the way everyone hoped.
A little bit about sad things…
CDMA turned off its antennas on April 11, 2011. There was a lump in my throat. Another two months to remove the switch from all networks and that's it. The shop is closed.
Almost no one was fired. They shoved whoever they could all over the new Rostelecom. Although some were unlucky.
I got into the cable TV department, worked there for 9 months and left to build the third generation in a cellular operator. Which was YUST/Yu-tel, and now has become Rostelecom. It also seemed to me that the future belongs to the third generation, and cellular communications are my path. But the world has really changed…
The future is already here!
Let's start with the main thing. The third generation was built not by the cellular companies, but by their contractors. They worked according to the scheme “the contractor assembles what he can, the cellular engineer arrives, fixes the jambs and does the commissioning”. This scheme was extremely economical. The contractor really did work with VERY cheap personnel. The personnel screwed up, but there was someone to clean up after them. The engineers no longer carried batteries (almost).
Perhaps, from the point of view of building a business, this was correct. But despondency seemed to have gripped the entire industry. Everyone sighed and discussed the contractor's mistakes and remembered better times, when…
Nobody thought that things could get even worse. Or tried not to think about it. And the future was right around the corner. The third generation had three most important features from an operational point of view:
Remember the network architecture of early cellular phones? A switch and a duty shift for each city? Well, they moved away from it. Switching centers appeared, capable of servicing a much larger number of subscribers, an entire region. Some switches were dismantled, some were left uninhabited or inhabited during working hours. New network technologies and good speeds in communication channels made it possible to do this. To engineers in smoking rooms, this seemed like nonsense. Like, what to do if you trust the switching center? Balance the load, reserve. Obvious answers.
The second difference follows from the development of network technologies. Third-generation equipment probably has an order of magnitude more control systems. It has become maximally clear what is happening with the network. There is no longer a need for so much preventive maintenance and engineering investigations have been reduced to a minimum. Everything has become transparent.
An unobvious but important difference. It was in third-generation networks that I first saw such a joke as an external unit. It is installed on a tower or mast behind the antenna and the antenna is connected to it by a jumper – a flexible and short RF cable. And the signal rises to the upper unit on the tower via optics.
This is really important. In the second generation, the same rigid copper feeder was raised to the tower. It was cut on site, terminated with connectors on both sides, and grounded. This is an incredibly labor-intensive process. And there is a lot of manual labor.
The feeder has two enemies. Water can get into its connector, then the SWR jumps and the transmitter can go into protection. There was a case when water was drained from the feeder like from a hose.
And secondly, it can be interrupted somehow. In any place. Then it can only be re-tightened. Can you imagine what it is like to re-tighten a copper cable three fingers thick on a 75-meter tower? That's a team, a bay of feeder, a bunch of equipment.
With the external unit, everything is simpler. Will the optics break? It can be easily re-strung by at least one person. Is the jumper out of order? The engineer always has a spare in the car, he will not even figure it out, he will change it and that's it.
The external unit burned out? Well, it weighs about ten kilograms, they'll bring a spare one and install it.
Feeders were a real problem, it was a very unreliable system, but at first there was no other. And moving away from them became a real revolution.
And so. By 2013, the third generation was, by and large, built…
Sudden ending
In January 2013, I was hanging on a rig at the central stadium, screwing a jumper to the antenna and cursing myself with the worst words. It was very cold, my hands were going numb in my thin gloves, and I, like the last asshole, forgot to tie the key to my hand. What if it slips out??? It falls down, there are people there. Having somehow finished the job, I put the key in my jacket, sealed the connectors and sighed. I've been climbing towers for a year now. But not a drop of joy. Stupid installation work, the engineer has to be turned on once a month. Basically – that's it. Climb the tower, check everything for the contractors, screw the jumper, because the contractor will screw up.
I realized that something needed to change. And that I wanted more.
The next month was spent looking for a new job. In the end, I received an offer to go to Intersvyaz. Remember that provider that was fighting with Er-Telecom in the battle for Internet/Cable TV?
The idea seemed strange, it was scary to leave the work of my life. Intersvyaz invited me to the head station of digital television. With the proviso that they require thinking a lot and often. I found it interesting.
Taking a deep breath, I went to my manager at Rostelecom and asked who to write the application to. We talked a little, he asked what was going on, tried to talk me out of it, but eventually gave in. He said – if it doesn't work out – come back, we are always waiting for you.
But I did it. The transition was a landmark moment in my life, comparable to the transition to Yandex. In my new place, I joined the Internet of Things, absorbed the latest wireless technologies, learned the basics of product management and personnel management.
As for the old place, after four months there was nowhere to return to.
The entire Rostelecom basic division was suddenly disbanded, thank you all and goodbye. All functions were transferred to a contractor, where some of my former colleagues were invited. But not all of them, and for worse salaries and conditions.
Thus ended the story of the good years for cellular operators.
Of course, I don't want to say that they are now living in hell on bread and water. No, many are quite happy with themselves and continue to do this. But now it's just a job, without wow! and super-profits. In some ways, it's even thankless.
P.S. A little about needs. Crunching free macadamia nuts in the Yandex office, I remember the pomp with which we in the radio communications department were presented with a cooler in 2007. To replace the old pump, which had almost fallen apart. Of course, we chipped in for coffee ourselves, and we still chip in. But now we have a cooler. It's just funny to remember the conditions in which we worked. I don't know why, but back then no one paid even close attention to this. It was warm, there were chairs, and that was fine. The fact that the table fell apart from old age – why did you spill so much coffee on it? It dried out.
It's been almost a year since I came to Yandex. But I still can't get used to HOW MUCH attention is paid to the comfort of employees. And now it's not even positioned as a perk, just some kind of standard in the IT industry. When we discuss the next office feature, we don't discuss it from the point of view of “they'll freak out.” We discuss that people should be comfortable, convenient, there should be human conditions. If you need to talk on the phone, go to the booth, don't disturb your colleagues and you'll feel calmer. And choosing a booth is a separate story, which I hope I'll tell you later.
In my 2007, with all my tender attitude towards it, the idea of a booth would have caused only surprise. Need to talk? Well, go out and talk, the corridor is big. As a last resort, go outside, there is a bench there. True, it is not ours, but the neighboring yard, but the locals do not chase you away.
And here is a booth… The future) I guess I won't be able to stop being surprised by this…
