[mod.telecom] Smaller portable cellular phone

covert@covert.DEC.COM (John R. Covert) (11/20/86)

    Walker Telecommunications Corp. has introduced the first 
    cellular phone small enough to fit into a pocket or purse. 
    the "Pocketphone" made for Walker by Britain's Technophone 
    Ltd., weighs 15 oz. and is nearly half the size of competing 
    models from Motorola and Mitsubishi.  Walker says that 
    physicians and lawyers have been the first to pocket the 
    $3,295 Pocketphone. 

    Don't expect cellular phones to get much smaller, however.
    Scientists still have not found a way to shrink the
    nickel-cadmium batteries that power the phones. The battery,
    which allows about 30 minutes of talk between recharges,
    accounts for most its weight and 1/3 of its bulk.  Another
    limitation is physiological: a phone must reach between the
    human ear and mouth. 
    {Business Week Nov 17, 1986}