There are numerous factors contributing to the dynamic growth of wireless communication systems we've been observing in the past 10 years, the most important being the increasing network user mobility and the technological advances in high-speed data transmission over radio channels. Research centres and standards-making institutions the world over conduct works on 3G integrated systems of person-to-person and person-to-computer communications, wireless counterparts of classical LAN, ATM and IP architectures, satellite and access networks as well as advanced service platforms like W AP and other concepts. Among the many commercial and non-profit organisations professionally involved in the development of the new information infrastructure, of particular influence is the International Federation for Information Processing. Within its Technical Committee TC-6, a working group WG 6.8 has been set up to co-ordinate IFIP activities in the area of wireless communications. It has done so, among others, by arranging regular meetings of academic and industrial researchers, known as IFIP TC-6 WG 6.8 Workshops on Personal Wireless Communications (pWC). Such workshops were held in recent years in Prague, Frankfurt/M, Tokyo and Copenhagen, and their success has resulted in the promotion of PWC to the status of IFIP Working Conference.
