Next stop: The always avalable connection
posted by Tomas Mcinernery on November 09, 2007
I haven’t done a technology entry for a while – but events within the cellular world recently got me thinking about the cellular/WiMAX discussion – how the development of both technologies is helping connectivity evolve.
We are still working towards the holy grail; ubiquitous connectivity (don’t groan – it’s Friday after all) and of course by that I don’t mean having employees connected 100% of the time, but simply the availability of high speed connectivity – so jumping on that VOIP call or sending that important document from a customer’s office isn’t a hassle anymore
The announcement recently of a duel GSM/CDMA (I’ll take the technology back to roots) mini PCI card for notebooks immediately got my attention, from an IT shop angle it starts to take some of the headaches out of the complications of deploying cellular as the standard remote connectivity technology. This card would allow you to connect from the majority of countries. A good step in the true WWAN direction
So that still leaves you with some IT type challenges – ones that WiMAX, with its open standards approach could address
Pricing model – Or better known as job 1/no one wants to spend that much. This is where I hope WiMAX will change the market. Enterprises have been spoilt with WiFi pay as you go pricing for so long it’s a real challenge to get back to paying a monthly fee, for some markets (your constant travellers) unlimited monthly usage works great; but for the majority who only connect once or twice a week it’s just overkill. Some of the larger telcos are starting to release pay as you use pricing, but it’s not consistent. I recently had an employee travel internationally with their data card – even implementing the international price plan can take phone calls/arrangements etc – this should be seamless
Carrier lock in – the ability to be flexible with the cellular connectivity is big, Unless you are based in one country purchasing locked hardware can cause challenges; you’ll have to keep it in that country or suffer roaming fees should you use it in other countries. This would be fine (since most cards can be purchased carrier free) but they cost more…telcos offer organisations a rebate on hardware which can sometimes help remove the initial barrier to adoption but in the longer run its inflexible
Technology – This is a good yet bad problem. Because cellular has been an evolving technology some markets or even areas of that market are still on ‘second generation’ implementations, some on ‘third generation’ and some way ahead on third plus. It means inconsistency for the users – higher speeds are better, sure, but it’s hard to explain to a customer that on the train from a too b they could get connection speeds anywhere from several megabytes to only several kilobytes. I would argue here in defence of cellular; since you are always ‘connected’ potentially unlike WiMAX as networks develop there will of course be black spots
All this adds up to an interesting question – the root of which (ubiquitous connectivity) won’t be solved for some time – but at least things are moving closer. As always interested in any thoughts.
Comments (4)
tagged: Cellular, employee productivity, mobility, WiMAX
Comments
Nov 09 | Michael Molin said:
The root of the problem is the availability of the ‘Mobile Internet’ services for everyone not only to corporate users that have notebooks and wireless connections. Why am I emphasizing the Mobile Internet services? It’s the only way to develop all this stuff for the devices that everyone has - cell phones. Do you remember how Apple told about ‘not watered down Internet’ on an iPhone in their ads? And what is now? Facebook has developed a special version of their site for iPhone. Because fast and comfortable working with information is a key thing. And ability to work with it on the go without a need for carrying the notebook with you everywhere.
The current situation suits cell phone carriers because they don’t have to worry about anything regarding ubiquitous connectivity for accessing to ‘information’ for everyone (just for corporate users) - people talk on their cell phones, text their SMSs (really, that’s something from pagers’ era - a message with 256 characters - and that’s for modern technologies of exchanging the information with megabit speeds) and not even tend to send their photos via MMS. Just because there is no compelling ‘Mobile Internet’ services with rich graphics except those that are being developed for an iPhone.
There is no mass demand for them in relation to other cell phone models. And why? Cell phones are not intended for access to information by definition - the only good job for them is voice communications. Now it’s already an old-fashioned category as pagers. Mobile content providers want to offer more than ringtones and games for subscribers around the world - music, video, TV, Mobile Internet.
A personal device have to be a business information tool first of all - a ‘personal computer’. The market of telecom and IT services is in need of a unified hardware platform with a x86 architecture as Intel Moorestown (with WiMAX connectivity) for the Mobile Internet development. The fact is that this platform is significantly closer to cell phone factor (42x145 mm) than an iPhone (61x115 mm).
Jan 09 | Rene Ylanan said:
Hi Tomas! Can you tell me where I can get good literature on the SLA’s that WiMAX offers?
Feb 11 | Tomas Mcinerney said:
@ Michael - Thanks for your comment. Agree some consumers are already experiencing an always on world, and for some they have enough not to move on…but I would position that’s because we haven’t cracked the next killer use case - didn’t they say we don’t need mobile voice before it was available? The internet content (to your watered down internet) I think will become so rich on the PC users want to experience it in it’s full glory (though, I would agree a market will always exist for the practical quick access summary type of information)
@ Rene - Are you looking for SLAs on the service, packet delivery side? Or the ISP side of quality of link? Let me know by comment if Google didn’t tell you the answer – our WiMAX site is a good place to start http://www.intel.com/personal/our-technology/wimax/
Feb 11 | Michael Molin said:
Tomas, the idea of the future Mobile Internet is that it’s the same for desktop/notebook PCs and mobile handsets if there is a standard platform for its development - the cell computer not a phone at all - cell phones are intended just for one function - mobile voice - the idea of smartphones is just a wishfull thinking without an effective user interface - and this needs at least 1,5 times more screen area than of iPhone’s display and other principles of working with information than one display of a PDA can offer.
It’s the key idea of my project - The Cell PC - I started in the middle of 2006 after I have created the Compact QWERTY Keyboard that is a complete implemetation of the US-International keyboard layout (53 keys for the matrix of keys plus F1-F8 keys and central ring with a trackball) for a MotoRAZR cell phone. This keyboard works on the second touch-screen display that is placed instead of the keypad.
The idea of the Mobile Internet site is that two displays of the cell PC work together to present the website as we see it on a desktop/notebook PC. The main top display shows - logo and content, the second display - menu and ads. And this mobile site works the same way on a desktop/notebook PC platform.