Category: Wireless

Wireless connections

3G: “The Networks are Ready, but the Phones Aren’t”

One of the many things coming out of the 3GSM Summit is the conflict between mobile network operators like Vodafone and T-Mobile and handset manufacturers: the network operators have made the networks, but the phones aren’t good enough to entice users to subscribe.

Mobile phone operators spent billions of euros on licenses to run 3G networks and are understandably concerned that they have not been able to make full use of new revenue opportunities.

At the 3GSM summit in Cannes, Arun Sarin, chief executive of Vodafone criticised existing phones for being bulky, possessing poor battery life and featuring unsatisfactory heat dissipation. He added “The experience today is unacceptable to our customers.”

Part of the problem is related to poor coverage in Europe. Not only does this mean that services are simply unavailable in areas, but it also requires that the phones run in dual 2G/3G mode, thus consuming far more power – hence the heat and battery problems not generally witnessed in Japan which has far better coverage. Since it is projected that, even by 2008, only 75% of all phones will be 3G, dual mode issues are expected to be around for a while.

Some see Sarin’s comments as a little dig at Nokia, with whom Vodafone have had a stormy relationship over the years, but with Nokia expected to have a strong 3G handset offering by the end of 2004, things seemed to have thawed between Sarin and Nokia’s CEO Jorma Ollila.

The Nokia/Vodafone Lovefest

Sarin: GSM stands for “God Send Mobiles”

Vodafone’s Connect Card Wins at Cannes

Vodafone’s Mobile Connect Card, launched in April 2003 has won the Best Mobile Application or Service: Corporate Market at the 2004 GSM Association Awards in Cannes.

The card is essentially a rebadged Option Globetrotter with a Vodafone data service and software suite. The package is designed to provide simple and secure access to company networks and the internet, and is plug and play thanks to the Vodafone dashboard and software.

Vodafone’s new version of the card, the Mobile Connect 3G/GPRS datacard will be available in many areas of Europe in the next month.

ZDNet’s review of the card

Ofcom Chair: UK with True Broadband by 2010

Fifty days in to Ofcom’s existence, its Chair David Currie delivered a speech to the Communications Management Association conference. He recapped on what Ofcom had been doing, then outlined where he felt it was going, focusing mainly on broadband.

We feel the most exciting part of the speech was, in his words, True Broadband.

Anyone with a real understanding of why broadband is such a vital part of the future will be hugely encouraged by his words. In summary, what is currently being sold as broadband to the UK consumer and many other around the world, a 512k connection, is not broadband. It is the equivalent of a 1200/75-baud modem.

We heartily agree with Currie view that ‘DSL at 512k is a convenience product’. He argues that it is not practical or possible for the UK to lurch from a 512k connection to something much faster – the current copper-wire based system we have simply would not support it.

Instead a target of 10Mbps should be set for 2010 and that it should be provided competitively. We read this as; the long lasting monopoly that BT has, and does enjoy will be removed. His comparison with the multi-supplier mobile market bears this out. In our view BT consistently hoodwinked Oftel. At first glance it looks like they will not have the same joy with Ofcom.

This was further underlined by his praise of the Parliamentary Trade and Industry Select Committee point that

‘[we must] make certain that the regulatory framework ensures that commercial decisions by private companies are aligned with the wider economic and social needs of the country.’

He and his colleagues clearly recognise and understand what is required for a proper broadband service. With connections being symmetric rather than the slow transmit, asymmetric we have now, he identified the need for the network to enable distributed system, not just central services delivering to the ends of the network. We also find it encouraging that he reiterated the pursuit of wireless connections.

Currie states his aim is ‘Liquid bandwidth; all you can eat; always on. No contention.’

Very encouraging.

Full text
David Currie, Ofcom chairman, Communications Management Association Annual Conference, 16 February 2004

Nokia and Samsung Work Together on Push to Talk

Push to talk over Cellular (PoC) is felt by the mobile phone business to become an exciting advance for consumers and business user alike.  PoC give a walkie-talkie style connection between two phones.

Nokia have been working on the technology for a while and have developed an open standards approach, which they have put forward to the OMA (Open Mobile Alliance) for use by the industry. They currently have it on trial with 30 operators around the world.

To underline how useful it is, Nokia must be pleased to announce today that Samsung will be releasing products in 2004/5 that will use the standard.

Nokia Announce Updated 9500 Communicator

After having blazed a trail with their originally Communicator almost ten years ago, Nokia have worked for the last year to develop and have now releases a new compact, lighter version called the 9500.

Working closely with IBM to target it at corporate users, they feel it will be particular useful to sales and support staff. This is being perceived as Nokia determination to be a big player in this market which Microsoft is applying a lot of attention to, as are Symbians co-developer Psion. Andy Brown, analyst at research group IDC says “The world’s number one in e-business services hooks up with the number one in mobile devices. This tells me Nokia is serious about developing products for enterprises, which I wasn’t sure about before.”

Thought to retail for around 800 euros (£538, US$1,000), it now support WiFi as well as cellular communications.

Nokia Boss Admits N-Gage Below Expectations

Jorma Ollila Nokia chairman and chief executive, admitted to the Financial Times yesterday that the N-Gage, their gaming platform, has not been the success they had hoped for, in his words “The sales are in the lower quartile of the bracket we had as our goal.”

The original aim was to sell 9 million units within its first two years, but many feel that the €300 (£200, US$380) is too expensive when compared with other gaming-only platforms such as the Nintendo GameBoy. It has also been criticised for its lack of game support and difficulty in operating it, in particular requiring the removal of the battery to change the game. The cracking of their game copy protection method last year has also not helped them with game publishers.

Ollila said he plans to wait until November 2005 to decide if it has been a success or failure.

Europe’s first mega-pixel camera phone launched by Vodafone

Vodafone has beaten the rest of the market to be the first to bring a mega-pixel camera to Europe. In a further development of their relationship with Sharp, it will be Sharp GX30.

Not content with being just a mega-pixel camera, this quad-band (GSM) phone of many features incorporates an MP3 player, offers Bluetooth support, has a removable SD memory cards and provides video message functionality. The screen on the handset has been significantly uprated to be capable of displaying 262,144 colours, four times its previous model, the GX20. It will be available in retail stores from March 2004.

Breaking the mega-pixel barrier is significant. At this resolution the photographs start to become useful beyond simply sending them other phones. The quality is sufficient to print them out and services such as Pixology (We QuickLinked earlier), are planning to take advantage of the always increasing resolutions.

The other direct benefit for Vodafone in higher resolution cameras’ becoming the norm is in increasing their call income – the higher the resolution, the more data there is to transmit, the higher Average Revenue Per User (ARPU). Raising ARPU is the mantra for mobile operators.

Vodafone’s global presence means it has tremendous clout and purchasing power enabling it to secure exclusive deals with phone manufacturers. It is known in the industry that Vodafone is keen to develop its own, branded phones in an attempt to break the power of Nokia on the phone market. They want to move their users from identifying with the make of handset, “I’ve got a Nokia” to “I’ve got a Vodafone”. Extending the relationship with Sharp is a further step towards that.

Vodafone

Sharp phones

Phone-on-a-chip Coming Soon

Bill Krenik, who heads up research and development in Texas Instruments (TI) wireless terminals business unit has been revealing the companies intention to create an integrated chip that will hold all of the functionality of a current smartphone, on a single chip. TI plan to have it available by the end of 2004.

TI, the world’s largest maker of cell phone chips say the integrated chip would reduction power consumption by a half and free up large amounts of the valuable system board real estate for additional chips providing features Wi-Fi high-speed wireless networking and satellite location tracking to be added to phones.

TI is not alone in thinking along these lines. Samsung were speaking about this very idea last week. They prefer the term System-in-Package chip and plan to show it at the coming GSM World Congress Conference in Cannes. Their chip will include a 203MHz ARM-based processor with 256MB of NAND flash memory, 256MB of SDRAM and support for USB.

Vodafone launches 3G in Europe

Vodafone have announced today that it will be starting its 3G service in Europe. Interestingly their first offering will be a data only service using the catchyly named Vodafone Mobile Connect 3G/GPRS data card, rather than a voice service. Slotting one of these into a laptop will provide data speed up to 384kbps.

It is clear that Vodafone is not just throwing money at bring their 3G service to the public – they are taking a cautious, measured approach to it. The service is launching in seven European countries over the next four weeks; UK, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. The coverage will not be comprehensive to start, but will focus initially on major cities and grow through transport routes, then expand over the next few years. When the 3G service becomes too weak, the card will automatically fall back to GPRS without interrupting service.

We feel there may be a number of reasons that Vodafone have launched their initial offering as a data service and not voice as was expected. In short, predictability – of income, subscribers and usage. The data service, aimed at businesses, will more than likely bring in more income than the voice service, for the use of the same infrastructure. It is unlikely that there will be thousands of individuals clamouring to get on to it and signing corporate accounts will give them a far better ability to plan for expansion and usage patterns. In addition, may be something as simple as they do not feel the handsets that are currently available would appeal to their clients.

Vodafone

New Nokia Phone Converges Too Many Features To List

Nokia have released phones with radios incorporated in them for some time — but the 7700 is somewhat different as it incorporates a service that Nokia has termed “Visual Radio”. Listeners to participating stations can interact through their phones – polls, artist information, ringtones are all displayed in 7700’s browser whilst they listen a radio show. Helsinki’s Kiss FM will be the first station to offer the interactive services.

Adding interactivity to a radio programme through a browser (rather than streaming the programme to the phone) allows Nokia to avoid rights issues and save bandwidth. To us this seems like a good stopgap, but streaming directly to the phone offers so much more functionality that it won’t be too long before someone sorts out the rights nightmare and produces a proper internet audio/video phone.

Nokia will no doubt be analysing what users do with the new interactive features from radio stations – cookies and server logs will show them which features are popular. If successful, charging for ringtones and extras from stations will be a nice revenue channel for Nokia and its radio partners.

The look of the phone could best be described as “funky” — Nokia seem to be getting further and further away from traditional mobile phone design with every new iteration of their products.

Nokia on the 7700

Kiss FM