Askey and Icom America Partner to Put Two-Way Radio on Private 5G Networks

LAS VEGAS, Nov. 4, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Askey and Icom America have announced a formal partnership under which the two companies will jointly market each other's solutions, pairing Askey's private 5G network hardware with Icom's two-way radio terminals and dispatch systems. The combination gives wireless internet service providers a complete package to sell into the plants, utilities, counties, and event grounds in their footprint: a private cellular network and the push-to-talk radios that run on it.

Icom, founded in Osaka in 1964 and represented in the Americas by Kirkland, Washington-based Icom America, builds land mobile, marine, aviation, and amateur radios, and supplies LTE and 5G radio terminals, gateways, and dispatch for public safety and industrial users. Askey, a member of the Asus group, manufactures the small cells, standalone 5G core, outdoor units, and devices that make up a private 5G network, managed through its All-In-One Management Platform (AMP). Under the partnership, each company's sales teams and channel partners will offer the other's products, with joint demonstrations beginning at WISPAPALOOZA 2026.

For a WISP, the pairing answers a question customers ask early: what do the people on site actually talk on? A sheriff's office, a public works crew, a grain cooperative, or a fairgrounds operator wants radios that work where public cellular does not, on a network it controls. With Askey radios on the tower and Icom radios in the trucks, a WISP can deliver both from one managed service.

"Our customers don't buy a network, they buy what runs on it," said Minchul Ho, SVP of Private Networks at Askey. "Icom has spent sixty years making radios that crews trust, and those radios now run on private LTE and 5G. Putting them on an Askey network means a WISP can walk into a county or a plant with the whole answer: coverage, voice, and one bill. That's a conversation our partners can win."