The hotspot feature that essentially turns your phone into a Starbucks without the coffee – WiFi hotspot using 3G as back-haul.  3G may not have enough capacity, but remember 4G is coming to a city near you.  The point is, my phone becomes my only truly connected device via the wireless wide area network, with a single data plan that allows any other device that I might carry to connect to the Internet through it, without extra payments.  As lame as the unconnected iPad is, it is the cheapest out there (before the gPad comes out).  My Android2.2 smartphone  will make it connected and I do not have to pay extra data.  With my laptop I can browse the web, download a book, send email, you name it, even if I don’t have a broadband adapter.  My phone is the broadband adapter.

Enhanced bluetooth means that I can now have an ergonomically perfect set of devices to manage my mobile life.  I can carry my phone in my pocket or briefcase and use my headset or car kit to dial, answer an make all phone calls.  I can even play music through my car’s fancy audio without plugging it in.  You can envision new devices that use these capabilities to get connected.  A camera, for example can upload to Picassa or YouTube directly without having to connect directly.  In-car GPS or portable can also connect and get faster first fixes, maps from your phone or PC, etc.

Again, this is hardly new, but the combination of all this features in Android 2.2 brings true mobility to the mainstream, and will definitely put a dent to iPhone’s reign, that is until Apple decides to add these features too.  The question that remains open is how will wireless service providers embrace a single data plan?  Today they all charge for “tethered mode” which is really what we all use in substitution of a broadband card; we don’t buy a card, but we still have to pay for the extra data plan.  If carriers do away with this extra charge, they will create an explosion of data traffic that they are most likely not ready for.  Sprint in the US has created a plan that allows all this for a fixed rate.  Sprint also has the only 4G phone available today and with its partnership with Clearwire they have a shot to regain market share even if it’s only to geeks like us.  Soon others will follow, though.

Soon 4G, better back-haul from your wireless service provider, and an Android 2.2 (or equivalent feature set) can make every device a connected device.  The ubiquitously connected world is getting a push.

Enjoy.

Let me tell you why I think that’s the case:  As lame as the whole category is in this blogger’s humble opinion, an unconnected (i.e. no cellular support) tablet is the lame of the lame.  It brings me back to the 90′s when you had to go home or to your office to get internet access.  Sure, the 3G iPad is about to debut, but @ $600+ i really think the market will be limited.  Now, if our friends in Verizon Wireless agree to pardon the Nexus One debacle and decide to subsidize the gPad, imagine what will that do to the price.  Neither Verizon, nor Google have to make money with the hardware, which really does a job to Jobs (sorry, couldn’t help it).  Estimates of the iPad cost put it at $250 – $300 US, add a 3G (or maybe a 4G – ooooh – radio), we could be seeing a street price in the $400′s.  Still hefty for a useless device, but less than $600+ for the emperor’s Pad (ePad?  now I’m pushing it).

But wait, there’s more!  Chrome Os is the word on the street, not Android.  What that may mean is a real processor capable of Flash (not Flash lite) and real browsing.  Yes, my friend, I believe it will be x86 based which means that every website you can go to on Chrome today – which is virtually any website known to mankind and robotkind – is accessible to your gPad.  Not even Palm’s (future HP’s MaxiPad) running WebOs can do that!  Apps anybody?  Yeah, sure, real apps with Java or the like, not fake widgets that look pixelated.  Content?  Did I mention it is Google?

So there it is.  As much as I hate the category, a subsidized x86 based tablet may be the ticket to ride.  BTW, Adsense must be having a ball with this post!  I’m sure the ads are funny albeit unrelated. Do comment.

Enjoy.

AT&T has close to 6 million non-phone devices on the network.  Now why is that even relevant, my fellow reader (singular)?  Simply because there are a lot more non-phone devices and a lot more things out there that need to be connected than there are phones or people.  Yes, they may not be sexy, play music, browse the web, or even wash your car, but they essentially do everything else.  Beyond the obvious (Kindles, iPads, etc.) these things are everywhere and in desperate need to be connected.

Take your car, for example.  If you have Onstar it’s already connected (not with AT&T) so you know some possible apps.  But imagine a world in which you go to Google Maps, plan a route and squirt it into your car’s GPS!  Or simply download the movie you want your kids to watch from your home DVR.  Your electric meter one day will be connected to so you can monitor your consumption real time (Ok, Ok, i don’t know why would I want to do that either, but you can).  Every thing out there can be connected and can benefit from the internet.  But where things really start changing is with Enterprise Applications.

Next time you receive a FedEx or UPS package go to the web  immediately after you sign for it and voila it says received, in real time because the device where you signed is connected.  The copier service personnel can consult schematics and order parts in real time when his/her machines are connected. Or the copier can ping someone when it’s running out of toner; the end of the  empty copiers or useless service visits.  Making every device a smart device has endless  applications that are starting to look affordable.  Ma Bell’s humble cellular non-phone numbers are starting to show growth.  The ubiquitously  connected world is getting started.  Make sure you are ready for it.

Enjoy.

During this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the world’s most important mobile trade show, everyone seemed to think that a new OS (Operating System) is the way to go.  It is unclear to me what makes them think that.

First, I’m a bit tired of the overuse of the OS nomenclature.  Few deserve this title since they are really adding proprietary layers on top of Linux.  Actually most do, even the beloved Android and iPhone.  They should all be called “platforms”.  However that is not the cause of my outrage. No.

Second, who does the branding for these things?  Symbian, Bada, MeeGo, Mobiln, MeeMo, LiMo, Else, and others in addition to the successful iPhone, RIM, and Android.  My favorite name in a sarcastic kind of way will have to be “Windows 7 Phone Series”.  Redmond finally got something that does not deserve bashing throughout the blogsphere – a la Vista – and decides to use it everywhere.  I get it, kind of makes sense.  But, my fellow follower (singular) Windows 7 has a nice ring to it.  Windows 7 Phone Series does not, I’m sorry.

Third is that application developers have better things to do than to port their app to the “OS” of the day. And who is thinking about users? Thanks to this inflation you will have to scavenge the world to find the right app if you made the mistake to buy a platform that didn’t quite make it for whatever reason.  Now that is an outrage, but not the point of my post.  Suffice it to say that there will be plenty of casualties in these OS’s flood.

Amidst this Mobile OS inflation there is one that in my opinion deserves mention:  MeeGo.  Sure, the name sucks but I’ll have to give it some points for obscure geekyness.  A shape-shifting 9000-year old alien from the planet Marmazon 4.0 has to attract the dormant or not so dormant geek in most smartphone users, from the Blackberry suits to the Android hoodys.  Let’s just hope it doesn’t suffer the fate of the CBS sitcom who didn’t get the chance to finish a single season mostly because it wasn’t any good.

Anyway, MeeGo is worth mentioning not because of the fact that it is a joint venture between Nokia and Intel.  MeeGo is a platform that promises to bring smartphones to the 2010′s by using an x86 architecture instead of the perpetual ARM.  x86 architectures are ubiquitous in the PC world whereas ARM architectures have their humble roots in the embedded world (you know watches, sensors, WiFi radios, set top boxes, routers, cellphones – Ok, not so humble).   ARM uses RISC – Reduced Instruction Set Computing – vs x86′s CISC – Complex Instruction Set Computing.  This difference has allowed computers to run more complex software and algorithms so they can behave like, well, computers.  ARM on the other hand is fundamentally more power efficient, which explains its huge presence in mobility.

Until now the lowest x86 has gone is Intel’s Atom family (which drove the netbook “revolution”).  What is so new about the Atom family?  Low power consumption in an x86 processor.  At the same time, Qualcomm has been touting its Snapdragon 1 GHz+ Arm based systems – base for the reference design of my favorite name Windows 7 Phone Series – and now powering some “smartbooks” (again with the naming).

You see what’s happening under the hood?  New product categories are being launched, OS inflation is flooding the mobile world but at its real core there is a tremendous collision happening.  ARM getting more powerful while x86 is getting more efficient.  This brings us back to why MeeGo is so significant for the industry.

x86 based phones are out there but none has really made a mark basically because they haven’t offered anything new.  In this blogger’s very humble opinion if Nokia-Intel get it right (which is a big “if”) this could be the next revolution in mobility: the power of a real computer in the palm of your hand.  With html 5, 4G networks, ubiquitous 802.11n WiFi,  comparative shopping, location based services, “billions upon billions” of webpages, will now be available to complex software thanks to CISC based smartphones.  By the middle of this starting decade we will all wonder what was the hype behind all these “clever-phones” that could barely browse the web.  We will remember them as we now think of the first color Mac’s.  Very cool but just a sign of what’s to come.

Enjoy.

Acording to ABI Research the world will consume a staggering 450 million laptops in 2012 and [gasp] 650 million smartphones.  If you take into account replacement cycles, that is how fast people buy a new one the results are pretty revealing.  A laptop, on average get replaced every 3 years, which means that roughly 1.35 billion people will buy one within 3 years.  A smartphone, thanks in part to carrier subsidies, is replaced every 2 years, meaning 1.3 billion people will buy one.  Of course, they are both the same people!  The question is, are those 1.3 billion geeks (what an amazing number buy the way) ready for a 3rd device and all the annoyances (chargers, accessories, batteries, breakage, data plans, network connections, etc., etc.) that come with it?  Not so much.

Unless: a) It substitutes a device you already carry.  b) enhances a device you already carry, c) it changes the way you interact with technology or d) it is so damn amazing that you have to have it.

A)  Substituting a device you already carry is kind of lame.  In order to do that it has to do everything the old device did and more.  Kind of what smartphones did for the cellphone.  But it comes at a price.  That is the approach Microsoft and partners in crime are taking with teh “convertible” laptop.  Ever since the Concerto, that approach has failed miserably.  The enhanced user experience that touch brings does not justify the extra cost.

B)  This may be the key to the tablet success.  What if you could share your smartphone’s dataplan but have access to a bigger screen when you need it?  Charge it and use the same accessories and apps your smartphone or your laptop uses but the experience is so much better due to touch, weight, a better screen and better interaction with your media.  In other words, your laptop becomes your “content creation” device and your tablet a “content consumption” alternative with much, much better experience.  The question still remains, how much is that worth and will manufacturers and carriers make money?

C)   Changing the way you interact with technology needs a huge amount of disruption.  One approach, suggested here, is to just make it part your your life and go after the time people spend with media in a different way.  That is all good, but IMHO, it will still limit the penetration.  As I have suggested in previous posts, the internet is desigend for a screem, a keyboard, and a mouse.  Last I checked, there are no plans to change that any time soon.  Be that as it may, media convergence – your pics, videos, blogs, magazines, books, news “papers”, etc. – in a single point may make sense, but again , at what price?

D)  Lastly, an amazing device will drive some crowds, especially from the Silicon Valley sweethart even if there is no use for it, like the Newton or Apple TV.  This unfortunately is very nichy and I doubt Apple, Microsoft, HP, and others will be making such a splash for a niche.

One could argue that the Amazon Kindle, by far the most successful of these form factors (which by the way is expected to sell some 6 million this year, puting it in the category of niche for geeks), has it right.  Mainly because it is designed to read books.  Anyone that has played with it can see why.  Great battery life, great form factor, light, and a brilliant eInk display that is the closest thing to paper that is powerd by a battery.  But the key genius of Amazon is not that the device is brilliant, is the business model.  Buy a book and voila, it gets delivered to your Kindle without having to worry about a data plan, a monthly bill, or extra charges.  It is still a 3rd device, but it substitutes the book, magazines, and newspapers we used to carry around.  THe lesson here is subsitute something you carry today and make it simpler, better, and cheaper (at least over the long run).

The question is what will the tablets strategy be?  It is tough to say, but as geeky as I am, I will wait before I splurge for the $500 – $1000 tablet plus an extra data plan.  For once, a “revolutionary” gadget does not excite me that much.  Is it a sign of aging or just a sign of the times?

Enjoy.

Without having had my hand on it it is tough for me to have an opinion on its performance. But given the engineering track record of Silicon Valley’s favorite they probably nailed it (even if they didn’t you know there will be a Nexus 2). But that is not what will make it a success, nor is that what is surprising about it. Motorola, LG, HTC, Sony Ericsson, and others have or have announced plans for Android powered smartphones. Yet, Google, the author of Android, decides to put out a device that competes with all of them. Moreover, Google does not have to make money from it (even though they will) since it is really a bet on mobile advertisement revenue. So far nobody has found a way to make money on mobile ads, but it is my contention that if somebody can figure it out it will most likely be Google. It is hard to imagine that Google decided to compete with their hardware partners just to make a “few” bucks selling hardware. They most likely did it for the same reason Google does everything else: to disrupt a market.

Imagine a world in which you do not have to pay for cellphone service. Pretty much the way you didn’t have to pay for TV in the past. Advertisers paid for it and consumers take advantage of that money flow. I know, I know, those days are waaaay over and not likely coming back anytime soon (until Google has a say). But in the mobile Internet business the biggest barrier to entry IMHO for mobile search to explode is the hefty $30 – $50 a month data fee from your preferred carrier plus a $100 – $300 “club entry fee” for your favorite smartphone. Sure there are hundreds of millions of smartphones out there and there will be more in the years to come, but the mobile search revenue still dwarfs the “fixed” one. Granted usability, contextual value, and other issues are still important. But Apple and Google will shortly solve those. Cost will remain a barrier. Unless, yes, unless it is free. In other words, paid by advertisers. You and I can pick our favorite smartphone subsidized by a carrier to get your voice revenue and Google pays your data plan as long as you search. Weird? Sure, but then again Google is known for its weird business models.

Enjoy.

The industry seems desperate to find an alternative to the iPhone so far with no success. Palm (the inventor of the category in a way) launched last week the “pre” a successor to the “pro” (pretty creative naming) that is supposed to be what we’re all been waiting for. Based on what Palm calls WebOS (do not try to pronounce it in Spanish) which is really a WebKit browser on top of a Linux kernel. It is to me just another “clever phone”, pretty well designed, but just a follow up.

The phone looks promising with a full touch screen, a sliding qwerty keyboard, a well thought out user interface and a great webkit browser. It is really an adequate challenger to the iPhone’s kingdom. The problem is the partner carrier. Sprint has been losing customers since the Nextel acquisition (at the tune of 300K/month at some point!) that did not go well at all. It has the worst coverage in the US and the least amount of international carrier partnerships. It has put all its eggs in the 4G JV with Clearwire and has not invested enough in the mundane 3 or 3.5G. If it wasn’t enough, the Pre is built on the CDMA technology, which is great, but very few carriers in the world support it. One will hope they thought about it and they are cranking an HSPA version as we speak for AT&T and most of the world. Better yet, a dual mode (like the Blackberry Storm) that supports both technologies in the same device. But for the Pre to stand a chance, it needs to find other carriers pronto.

The battle for the smart phone kingdom currently dominated by Research in Motion (aka RIM) the creator of the Blackberry with the most successful lineup in the industry that seems to yet unchallenged (yeah even by the iPhone). The interesting thing is that Windows Mobile (WM), the first mobile OS with (sort of) a real mobile browser after WEP is falling behind, way, way behind. LG, Motorola, Samsung, HTC, and others serve up WM phone of varying success but no where near what RIM has been able to accomplish. When in 2006 there were twice as many WM phones shipped than any other smart phone.

Now, there is still the battle of the App Stores where Apple has an apparently unbeatable lead. Palm has not announced its store yet (as RIM has) but the Pre is iTunes compatible…weird thing. Is it a play for the true alternative to the iPhone or is it something else like someone getting ready to buy Palm? Who knows. But in any case, Nokia failed miserably with its store, RIM’s success is yet to be seen, and Windows’ App store, well …, will be Windows: late and not so impressive.

This battle brings memories of the glorious days of the RAZR, where everybody had one but Moto still sold 100M phones until it fell off a cliff with no true follow up. Will the iPhone follow the same fate? and the Pre, HTC-magic, G2, Moto-Q, STORM, Dare, and all sorts of weird unimaginative names – all probably registered trademarks – being the “me too’s” will also fall into oblivion soon? Check out a great comparison here.

A real mobile internet is what is needed. Check my other post What’s next after the iPhone and tell me what you think.

Enjoy.

Mobile network deployments are expected to provide up to 15 Mbps of capacity within a typical cell radius deployment of up to three kilometers. Its main application is allowing for urban areas and cities to become “metro zones” for portable outdoor broadband wireless access.
WiMAX is classified as a 4G technology in the sense that it is significantly different than 3G wireless technologies like HSPA or EVDO.   Due to these differences, service providers can launch teh technology significantly cheaper than prior versions.   At the same time they drive complexities and high cost for the device manufacturers particularly in its early stages.

The main characteristics in the standard that make WiMAX so compelling are:

1. S-OFDMA (Symmetric Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access). The OFDMA modulation scheme allows for a significant improvement in spectral efficiency over CDMA used in 3G. This translates into higher capacity on the same spectrum allocation for the service provider. Symmetry allows for same upload and download speeds, critical for Web 2.0 applications where the user requires similar bandwith in both directions. The combination of these 2 features allows WiMAX to perform very similar to a traditional broadband connection like DSL, cable, or enterprise T-1’s and at faster speeds.

2. Full IP architecture: Non circuit switched architectures allow for bandwidth on demand applications as well as an easy expansion over time. This drives the right economics for the service providers allowing very high bandwidth reuse factors. Very similar to the wired Internet that grew extremely fast.

3. MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output): This technology enables a significant channel efficiency compared to SISO (Single Input Single Output) used in 3G by adding frequency diversity to the communications channel. Fading and multi-path, so common in urban environments and indoors, are frequency dependent. MIMO increases the probability of uncorrupted packets arriving at their destination. From the service provider perspective this translates into more users in the same spectrum due to the reduction in retransmissions and lost packets. From the device perspective battery consumption is being saved.

4. Frequency Agnostic: There are currently WiMAX deployments across the world in 450, 700 MHz; 1.9, 2.1, 2.3-2.7, 3.3-3-5, and 5.8 GHz, both in licensed and unlicensed bands. This allows adaptation to the spectral allocations and flexibility for large or small service providers. This is perhaps the feature that has yet to be rationalized since it presents a lot of complexities and cost for device manufacturers, particularly for international enterprise deployments such as multi-national companies.

5. Support for TDD (Time Division Duplex) and FDD (Frequency Division Duplex) profiles: This part of the standard allows for flexibility to adopt WiMAX in frequency ranges where either scheme is technically preferable or mandated by local regulatory bodies.

6. IABF (Intelligent Adaptive Beam Forming): This feature is particularly critical for urban environments where power is lost through absorption in buildings and other interferers. It also allows devices to operate at lower power by introducing antenna gain in the communication channel which also translates into longer battery life.
Although all of these features are technically compelling there are not WiMAX exclusive. Most notably the other 4G technologies that are being analyzed (LTE or Long Term Evolution and UMB or Ultra Mobile Broadband) are following similar technical recommendations.

It is worth noticing the complexity of this technology from the device perspective. Multi-frequency systems will drive complex RF front ends and antennae whereas TDD/FDD profiles with MIMO and OFDMA drive very complex baseband architectures. Silicon suppliers will require significant R&D investments in order to address these issues efficiently.

There are basically two main standards driven by the IEEE. 802.16d or “fixed” WiMAX, which is designed for fixed, nomadic, and portable applications. This standard competes with fixed wireless proprietary architectures, Metro-WiFi and hot spots. 802.16e or “mobile” WiMAX is geared towards internet-on-the-go-applications.  This is the version that is most relevant for a 4G applications.

The WiMAX standard is the result of two main standards bodies: IEEE-802.16 and the WiMAX Forum. It is similar to WiFi in the sense that the IEEE (802.11)is responsible of setting the standards and a group formed by industry leaders (WFA) is responsible of ensuring interoperability. Today more than 500 companies are members of the WiMAX forum, 170 of whom are service operators. Some of the most notable are Motorola, Intel, Sprint-Nextel®, Clearwire®, Bell Canada®, Vodafone®, Nokia-Siemens®, Alcatel-Lucent®, IBM®, and Cisco® through the aquisition of Navini in 2007.

The September 2007 WiMAX World conference in Chicago, one of 3 held worldwide that year drew an estimated 7000 attendees from some 500 companies and around 100 speakers. In contrast, 3GPP and the OMA (Open Mobile Alliance) responsible for driving the GPRS / UMTS activities has thousands of members and runs 3GSM event twice a year. The European event that same year drew 70000 attendees, 1300 exhibitors and 500 speakers (120 CEOs).

As promising as WiMAX sounds, it has not been selected by major service providers around the world for their 4G deployments. the only exception  has been the CLearwire-Sprint JV.  LTE in contrast has been given significant preference throughout the world and has the potential to overshadow Clearwire’s attempts.  In the US AT&T and Verizon have announced LTE as their 4G technology of choice.  Combined they boast more than 150 million subscribers.  In addition to that it is expected that most European service providers will follow the LTE route as well.  The economies of scale that this will provide for device manufacturers is tremendous.

The only advantage WiMAX has over LTE is the fact that it exists today.  An advantage that has a very, very short shelf life.  Can Sprint/Clearwire launch the service fast enough to gain some subscribers or AT&T and Verizon Wireless beat them to the punch?  A quick glance at their balance sheets will provide a hint.

WiMAX, perhaps one of the most exciting technology developments of the 21st century has the potential to suffer the fate of iDEN:  outstanding technology, potential for a great service, but relegated to a single service provider.

Enjoy.