Paul Poutanen

Verizon is following the open source mantra and will allow the option of connecting hardware and software not sold by the company to its network. This is going to be available by the end of next year.

End of next year? That is a bit long. What is going to happen in the next year…..

ZDnet thinks it is a bit sinister as it is basically a hedge against the iPhone….
Verizon Wireless to be as open as the iPhone

As well Verizon says the handsets and or software must still meet their technical standards…

I think some of this will not be as easy as you think…. The carriers are public companies that need to show quarterly results…

But it is good to see a company like Verizon making this move…Who will be next?

ATT has already talked about open standards for the iPhone…..

Any Canadian carriers thinking this way? I would doubt Bell Mobility as they are in a hiring freeze right now held up by the Ontario Teachers Pension.

My guess is Rogers…GSM handsets are better and there are more of them worldwide….

The problem with too many choices is sometimes you do not make any.

Take the existing mobile marketplace right now.

Do you want a smart handset?

Do you want a cheap handset?

Do you want emails on your  handset?

Do you want music on your handset?

Do you want to go to websites?

Do you want to only make calls?

Then what combos of the above do you want? How much are you willing to spend?

Then put yourself in the world of the mobile developer. They have to decide what the market will buy and choose as to what has been given to them. If they are selling to Verizon, the code better be in Brew, at Sprint J2ME.

If you are a Nokia handset you will likely need to crank out Symbian. Every type of handset is different.

Here is a synopsis of what is available

XHTML/Wap family
the iPhone mobile browsing family with native and objective C
Symbian
Windows Mobile
FlashLite
J2ME

Google has just announced Android While some people are heralding the
new SDK, others are not so sure.

One thing we know for sure right now, is it will take years to hit any kind of critical mass. There are too many manufacturers and software developers with their own special interests to make this happen too soon.

However do not underestimate Google. They have cash and they have power. What they do not want however is to be bullied by carriers….They want to be the carrier. They know the frustrations of the average user. And they want advertisements on the phone.

The Android Developer Challengeis interesting as it is a good way to jumpstart some developers. I think the more seasoned professional developers will wait until wait a while until there are more developments in the mobile space before proceeding. $10 million is a start but not enough to stop a paying gig. I think $100 million would have made a major splash.

Below are the categories that Google is suggesting…

Social networking
Media consumption, management, editing, or sharing, e.g., photos
Productivity and collaboration such as email, IM, calendar, etc.
Gaming
News and information
Rethinking of traditional user interfaces
Use of mash-up functionality
Use of location-based services
Humanitarian benefits
Applications in service of global economic development

One thing is for sure, things are not getting easier in the mobile space… They are getting more complicated.

Looks like the carriers in Canada may be getting a little scared about competition.

Google?

Got back from the Wireless Connections conference in Banff and I was very glad to go.

Good to get the contacts back up and see people I had not seen for a while.

 I was called into a panel discussion when a speaker cancelled. The discussion was on the difficulties mobile application developers have getting into carriers ie becoming commerical.

I was on the panel with Robert Davies P.Eng.  Senior Scientist at TRLABS (www.trlabs.ca) and ajunct professor at the University of Calgary and James Maynard, President of Wavefront (www.wavefrontac.com).   Duane Sniezek, P.Eng. Director Operations, TRLabs Calgary and COO of NEWT (www.newt.trlabs.ca) moderated the discussion.

The discussion moved to the future mobile space.

I put out my future gazing and speculation. I see Google buying Sprint not for subscribers but for the tower agreements. Google is looking to buy the 700 MHz sprectrum and they need to deploy somehow. The FCC has mandated this should be open.

TRLabs creates innovative technologies and trains students to enhance ICT expertise and improve Canada’s global competitiveness. Five labs across the prairie provinces employ university professors, graduate students, industrial partners, and staff researchers.

Wavefront is the commercialization bridge between the wireless developer community in British Columbia and the mobile operators, government and large enterprises that are deploying new wireless products and services. In collaboration with its established partners, wavefront provides the developer community with neutral, independent test services and the market knowledge to enable rapid commercialization.

NEWT, the Network for Emerging Wireless Technologies, is a wireless development centre providing hardware and software design, implementation and test support to developers of wireless products and services. The technical staff, industry network, lab facilities and test environments reduce product development costs, shorten product development time, increase technical knowledge and gain competitive advantage through accelerated creation and adoption of wireless technology.

I am off to the Wireless connections conference in Banff.

Looks like an interesting agenda…. http://www.wirelessconnections.ca/wc2007/documents/WC07Program.pdf

I will comment more tomorrow.

Networking opportunities are always important.

The world of technology is changing everyday.

I see major trends in crowd-sourcing, and the mobile space.

A bit about myself.

I have been in the hi-tech area for over 20 years.

With 2 engineering degrees, I have 6 years experience as a senior management consultant with Ernst and Young.

I was at Wi-Lan (wireless communication) in the early days as director of applications and sales engineering, where we launched the largest educational wireless system in the world.

As director of tower management at Cell-Loc (location technology), we signed deals with 4 of the biggest tower companies in the USA.

At Blister Entertainment, www.blisterent.coma wholly owned subsidiary of Knowledgewhere www.knowledgewhere.com , we launched the first location based games on Mobile handsets in North America. The game Swordfish, won bast game in the Canadian New Media Awards in 2005.

As advisor to Cambrian House, www.cambrianhouse.com , it has been very interesting to be a part of a groundbreaking technology that uses the crowd to achieve their goals.

I am vice president of the Digital Media Association of Alberta.  www.digitalalberta.com

Now, as founder of Mob4Hire Inc., www.mob4hire.comwe intend to make the world easier for mobile application developers, through crowd-sourced mobile application testing.