Engineering services company P3 Group expands Mississauga operations

International consulting, management and engineering services company P3 Group has expanded into a new 3,500 square foot office in Mississauga, to serve the testing and network optimization needs of Canada’s mobile carriers and device manufacturers, which the company has been doing since 2013.

P3’s Mississauga team of 14 device, network and application engineers conduct functional and performance tests at product development, certification, implementation and post-launch stages, traveling throughout Canada in specialized test vehicles, or on foot for business and public venues, to evaluate end user device function, service quality and usability.

P3 is also a strategic supplier to the aerospace industry’s OEM and Tier 1 suppliers, helping to bring several major development plans to market through its Montreal office.

“We are very happy to grow our footprint here in Canada, especially as we move toward an integrated service portfolio between our aerospace, automotive and telecommunications platforms,” said P3 Group Canada, Inc. managing director Mark Makoukji. “This diversity has been a key differentiator for P3, and will continue to be a big part of our strategy moving forward.”

Simultaneous to the Canadian expansion, P3 has also announced the availability of U get, an Android smartphone app available at Google Play, that works in the background collecting data on individual smartphones, showing data speeds and signal strength, dropped calls and how much time is spent between 4G LTE, 3G, 2G and WiFi networks.

“Network performance is personal and consumers expect high quality connections,” said P3 communications, Inc. CEO Dirk Bernhardt. “Carrier claims to the largest, fastest and most advanced networks are meaningless if they do not apply in your local area. What matters is the coverage you get where you live, work and travel. With U get, average smartphone users can evaluate the quality of the service they really get when and where they need it. This puts the power of data in consumers’ hands and helps them make informed decisions about service providers. For wireless carriers, understanding this user experience is the key to winning the wireless race.”

Over the past three months, P3’s smartphone users generated data on more than 23.5 million mobile connection tests, six million speed tests and 8.2 million voice calls, and analyzed more than 95,000 days of anonymous smartphone app usage, almost 74,000 gigabytes of data and assessed the quality of nearly 260,000 hours of voice calls.

P3’s new Mississauga office complements P3’s Montreal facility, which was established in 2008 and employs more than 50 aerospace engineers catering to Montreal’s aerospace market, with a specialization in system and structural design, advanced aerodynamics, cabin design, manufacturing engineering and certification.
While P3 has been testing wireless devices, network quality and service performance globally for more than a decade, the company’s Toronto-area team has also been providing international device testing and network roaming measurements for U.S. carriers, OEMs, and chipset suppliers since 2007.

“We’re all about solving deep technical problems for our customers,” said Bernhardt. “In addition to performing certification, usability, application and security testing for wireless devices, we also assess service performance and benchmark mobile and fixed communications networks. Our comprehensive approach combined with our suite of proprietary and certified diagnostic tools help Canadian carriers bring new devices to consumers more quickly, streamline network deployments and optimize service performance.”

Last year, P3 performed the first independent mobile benchmark of Voice over LTE services in the United States.

“We continue to grow at a rapid pace and are excited about expanding our Canadian team,” Bernhardt said. “The Toronto area is a hotbed for wireless carriers and device manufacturers. At the same time, it is becoming a key area for research and development for connected car telematics, creating new opportunities for us to partner with P3’s Canadian automotive division. We are strategically positioned for success and look forward to continued growth in Canada.”

P3 last month announced an office in Brazil, with plans for two more office openings as the company’s telecommunications work in the Americas expands.

In addition to P3’s Mississauga and Montreal offices, they also have office hubs in Morristown, Dallas, Detroit, Greenville, Los Angeles, San Jose, Portland, Seattle, Mexico City and São Paulo.