NEWS: Textcaster's Text

In 2006, Missouri state Sen. Charlie Shields (R-34) presented Rob Sweeney, CEO of Mobile Media Technologies (MMT), with a resolution recognizing MMT as a contributor to the state’s economic development. MMT owns the text messaging service, Texcaster. (L-R) Sweeney; Shields. Photo courtesy of Missouri Small Business & Technology Development Centers.

Sweeney Odd
Textcaster CEO Rob Sweeney blames AT&T for Texting Troubles

Since Kansas City-based Textcaster administers the TXTJCCC service, I sent an e-mail asking about the problems disseminating text messages. Rob Sweeney, CEO and founder of Mobile Media Technologies, which owns Textcaster, replied Feb. 15.

Hello Miguel,

We are aware of the recent intermittent delays in text message delivery that clients have experienced when using their TextCaster application. Within the past week, we were able to indentify [sic] the cause of these intermittent delays. This involved a full review of all wireless carrier statistics, throughput rates and queue dependencies affecting all messaging traffic across the United States.

Our research uncovered delivery latencies with Sprint and AT&T. We immediately contacted network operations personnel at each carrier to alert them of the issues we were facing with the delivery of content into their respective networks. Sprint immediately worked with us on a resolution and promptly resolved the matter within days. This action by Sprint has greatly helped service delivery, and, within the past few days, we are seeing no delays in message delivery at this time for Sprint subscribers.

In conversations with AT&T leadership, they acknowledged network difficulties with all data traffic throughout the United States. We suggested technical alternatives similar to what was put in place at Sprint and were advised that this solution may not help resolve the AT&T network issues in the immediate future due to their internal constraints. Nevertheless, we continue to work on a resolution with AT&T and are hopeful that service delivery will improve over time. In the past few days, we have seen some improvement, but we still seek greater reliability.

In the meantime, TextCaster still supports AT&T and we will continue to monitor their network capacity and explore alternatives with their leadership team.

If you have any specific questions relating to this matter, I welcome your phone call.

Regards,

Rob Sweeney
CEO - TextCaster
Office: 816-268-2581

I've sent an e-mail to Don Brown, AT&T's Kansas media spokesperson, asking how AT&T plans to remedy the situation. I also contacted the Olathe and Shawnee Mission school districts who also use Textcaster service and have reportedly experienced the same problems as JCCC. I'll post those replies when and if I get them.