What can we expect for the fast-moving telecommunications market this year?
There are many predictions. I started looking for information from Twelve 2012 Predictions For The Telecom Industry and Top 12 Hot Design Technologies for 2012 articles. Then I did some more research on what is happening on the field and decided to make my own list of what is expected this year. You can go to the original information sources by clicking the links to see where all this information comes from.
The global telecommunications services market will grow at a 4% rate in 2012 (was 7% in 2011).
Mobile growth does not stop. The number of global mobile subscriptions will pass the 6 billion mark in February. India will pass China to become the world’s largest mobile market in terms of subscriptions.
The mobile handset market will surpass the $200 billion mark. Smartphones are most heavily used by people under 45, and that age group increasingly sees the smartphone or tablet as a portal to Facebook and Twitter, among other social networks. The demand for the chips that generate and process that data in smartphones is increasing (sales of smartphone applications processors surged to $2.2 billion in the third quarter of 2011). Six Companies Want Supremacy On The Smartphones Chip Market! Qualcomm Look Out!
There is lots of competition on mobile OS marker, but I expect that thing continue pretty much as 2011 ended: Android continues to boom, RIM and Microsoft decline. Symbian’s future is uncertain although Symbian started and finished 2011 as the undisputed king of mobile OSs (33.59%). Windows Phone will try to get to market and Leaked Windows Phone Roadmap gives us a peek into the future. Java Micro Edition making a comeback according to the NetApplications report because large number of low-cost feature phones. The real mobile application battle lines of 2012 will be drawn across the landscape of HTML5.Tizen open source project tries to push to mobile Linux market (first version Q1 2012) with ideas from Meego, LiMo and WebOS. Cars and smartphones start to communicate using MirrorLink technology to allow new features.
Mobile campaigns to be hot in 2012 presidential race article tells that though mobile advertising not seen much on the campaign trail, mobile strategy is expected to be important for attracting younger voters. Social networks played an important role in the last U.S. presidential election, but the explosive growth in smartphone usage and the introduction of tablets could make or break the candidates for president in 2012. Expect to see specialized apps to help campaign groupies follow the candidates.
Text messaging has been very profitable business for mobile phone operators and making them lots of money. Text Messaging Is in Decline in Some Countries tell that all signs point to text messaging’s continuing its decline. There has been already decline in Finland, Hong Kong and Australia. The number of text messages sent by cellphone customers in USA is still growing, but that growth is gradually slowing, “SMS erosion” is expected to hit AT&T and Verizon in this year or next years. The fading allure of text messaging is most likely tied to the rise of alternative services, which allow customers to send messages free using a cellphone’s Internet connection.
EU politicians want to ban roaming charges according to Computer Sweden magazine article. If the proposal becomes law in the EU, it takes away slippery roaming charges for mobile data (could happen earliest at summer 2012, but I expect that it will take much more time). Roaming robbery to end – 2015 article tells that the goal is that the mobile roaming fees should be completely abolished the 2015th.
Near Field Communication (NFC) is becoming available in many mobile phones and new flexibility via organic materials can help in implementing NFC. NFC-enabled SIM cards are expected to become a worldwide standard. Electronic wallet in smartphones probably takes a step forward with this. Google, opened the game with Google Wallet service. According to research firm ABI Research estimates that in 2012 NFC phones is growing 24 million to 80 million units. There is still years to wait until mass market on NFC wallets starts. ABI Research estimates that there is 552 million NFC enabled devices at year 2016.
The 4G technology WiMax will see the beginning of its end in Asia. Like operators in other regions, Asian operators will opt for the rival 4G technology LTE instead.
The number of active (installed) PCs worldwide will pass the 2 billion mark. Broadband penetration continues to increase. Broadband penetration of the world’s population will pass the 10% mark globally. IPTV (Internet Protocol TV) penetration of the world’s population will pass the 1% mark. Broadband technologies are fundamentally transforming the way we live. UN wants two-thirds of the world online by 2015.
Today’s Cable Guy, Upgraded and Better-Dressed article tells that the cable guy is becoming sleeker and more sophisticated, just like the televisions and computers he installs. The nearly saturated marketplace means growth for cable companies must come from all the extras like high-speed Internet service, home security, digital recording devices and other high-tech upgrades.
Ethernet displaces proprietary field buses. As Ethernet displaces proprietary field buses to facilitate the operation of the digital factory. Ethernet switches are the ubiquitous building block of any intelligent network. Ethernet has also become the de facto networking technology in industrial automation even in mission-critical local networks. Modern Ethernet switches have added significant new functionality to Ethernet while decreasing port prices. Ethernet for Vehicles also becomes reality largely to serve the expected boom of camera-based applications in cars.
Operators’ growth will increasingly depend on their having a cloud computing strategy, an approach for the high-growth IT service market and a clear value proposition for the enterprise market. Data center technologies will be hot topic. 10GBase-T Technology will become technically and economically feasible interface option on data center servers. 10GBase-T Technology allows you to use RJ45 connectors and unshielded twisted pair cabling to provide 10Mbps, 100Mbps, 1Gbps, and 10Gbps data transmission, while being backward-compatible with prior generations.
40/100 Gbit/s Ethernet will be a hot topic. Carriers and datacenters have been clamoring for the technology to expand their core backbone networks. 2012–A Return to Normalcy and Pragmatic, Power Conscious 100G article mentions that in 2010 and 2011, the industry saw the first real roll-outs of 100G transport solutions based on Coherent Detection and FPGA-based Framers. In 2012 we’ll start to see 100G taking a bigger place in the build out of new and existing networks around the world. The initial deployments of 100G are clearly too costly and too power hungry to be widely deployed as the primary transport technology, so optical transport marketplace will move to much lower power and lower cost Direct Detection optical transport solutions. The average WDM link for 10G is dissipating about 3.5W per optical module, the average WDM link per 100G is dissipating about about 100W.
5 Major Changes Facing the Internet in 2012 article tells that 2012 is poised to go down in Internet history as one of the most significant 12-month periods from both a technical and policy perspective since the late 1990s. This year the Internet will face or can face several milestones: root servers may have a new operator, new company could operate the .com registry, up to 1000 new top-level domains will start being introduced, additional 10,000 Web sites will support IPv6 and Europe will run out of IPv4 addresses.
No IPv6 Doomsday In 2012. Yes, IPv4 addresses are running out, but a Y2K-style disaster/frenzy won’t be coming in 2012. Of course there’s a chance that panic will ensue when Europe’s RIPE hands out its last IPv4 addresses this summer, but ‘most understand that they can live without having to make any major investments immediately. Despite running out of IPv4 addresses we will be able to continue to use IPv4 techniques (Asia depleted all of its IPv4 address space already April 2011). ISP’s and hosting companies will not run out of IPs. This only means that the price per IP will start to slowly grow. Forward thinking enterprises can spend the year preparing for the new IPv6 protocol (USA is expected run out of addresses next year). Comcast has said it will offer production-quality IPv6 services across its nationwide network in 2012.
Operators start to pay more attention to the business opportunity of “M2M” (machine-to-machine connections). Investment and innovation in M2M (think smart energy meters and fleet trackers for logistics) will follow.
Smart Grid technologies include smart power management and architecture system components are already hot. Smart meter deployment on the rise globally. The global power utilities are the next mega-market moving from analog, standalone systems to digital networked technology. The opportunities are huge in everything from wireless components in smart meters to giant power electronics. First cut of some very basic framework standards have been drafted and lots of works needs to be done (ensure safety!). Forward-looking utilities and such vendors have now put business units and plans in place. IPv6 is seen as a needed technology in implementing Smart Grid communications. IPV6 has become a buzz word for smart grid firms.
You Will See A Ton Of Hype Around “The Internet Of Things” article tells that “The Internet Of Things” is a catchy term revolving around the idea that most everyday objects around us will be equipped with internet-collected electronics, and this will open up new applications. You Will See A Ton Of Hype Around “The Internet Of Things”, and it is hard to say if The Internet Of Things will be a huge business or a passing fad. NXP Semiconductor’s vision of Internet of Things starts with lightbulbs. Wireless sensor networks will get attention. EE Times article Top ten Embedded Internet articles for 2011 gives you links to articles that help you to catch on those topics.
Security issues were talked about lot on 2011 and I expect the discussion will continue actively during year 2012. There are still many existing security issues to fix and new issues will come up all the time.
802 Comments
Tomi Engdahl says:
NPD: seven percent of all US smartphones sold in Q4 2011 were LTE-enabled, six percent WiMAX
http://www.theverge.com/2012/3/13/2868326/4g-smartphone-sales-numbers-lte-wimax-q4-2011
According to an NPD Group study released today, over 35 percent of US smartphones sold in the fourth quarter of 2011 were 4G-enabled, up from six percent last year. Of course, what “4G” means is up for debate; for the purposes of this study, 14.4Mbps-capable HSPA+ phones like the relabeled iPhone 4S counted. Not surprisingly, then, 62.9 percent of “4G” smartphones sold in the quarter were of the HSPA+ variety, followed up by 20 percent from LTE devices, and 17.1 percent from WiMAX phones
Tomi Engdahl says:
The New Apple TV Will Finish What The Mac Started: Killing Off Discs
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/14/the-new-apple-tv/
I remember watching the HD DVD vs. Blu-ray wars closely a few years back. I wanted one to win so I could go out and buy a next generation movie player. But the battle went on and on, and by the time Blu-ray won, I had set my sights on a new frontier: digital distribution. I never did get that Blu-ray player. And now I’m quite certain I never will. The new 1080p Apple TV is here.
To be clear, because of the way it’s compressed, iTunes 1080p content is not equal to the 1080p picture you’ll get from a Blu-ray disc. It’s very close, but it’s not quite there yet.
1080p video smackdown: iTunes vs. Blu-ray
http://arstechnica.com/apple/guides/2012/03/the-ars-itunes-1080p-vs-blu-ray-shootout.ars
What can we conclude from this?
I was surprised to see how close the iTunes 1080p download comes to Blu-ray, considering that it’s only a fraction of the file size. And let’s be honest: there are lots of Blu-ray titles that look much worse than this iTunes download. But despite an impressive effort by Apple, Blu-ray still reigns king when it comes to image quality. And unlike iTunes titles, BRDs can have uncompressed multi-channel audio, multiple audio language options, and special features. Am I being greedy in wanting both good-looking downloads for convenience, as well as buy-once-play-anywhere Blu-ray discs of my all-time favorite movies?
Tomi Engdahl says:
Smartphone owners demand bigger screens
http://www.reghardware.com/2012/03/15/researcher_reveals_smartphone_buyers_want_bigger_displays/
If you’re one of those folks who favour smartphones with supersize screens, you’re not alone. Nearly 90 per cent of your fellow phone owners want handsets to have bigger displays.
So reveals market watcher Strategy Analytics after polling punters earlier this year. The favoured screen sizes range from 4.0 to 4.5 inches, it said.
“Almost 90 per cent of existing smartphone owners surveyed chose a prototype smartphone with a display larger than their current device,” said SA’s Paul Brown.
There’s a catch: folk are only willing to put with with bigger sizes if the handsets are thin and the weight remains low.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Study: U.S. mobile backhaul demand to grow nearly 10x by 2016
http://www.fiercewireless.com/story/study-us-mobile-backhaul-demand-grow-nearly-10x-2016/2012-03-13?utm_campaign=TwitterEditor-FierceWireless
The demand for mobile backhaul in the U.S. market will increase 9.7 times between 2011 and 2016, according to a new research report, fueled by growing data demands and the move to faster networks.
According to research firm iGR, the demand for U.S. mobile backhaul will grow at a compound annual growth rate of nearly 58 percent between 2011 and 2016. As a subset of that, iGR found that growth of fiber backhaul is expected to reach a CAGR of nearly 85 percent during the same period. Although microwave backhaul is still in the mix in terms of solutions for operators, iGR noted that fiber has rapidly become the preferred mode of backhaul transport.
“Just as the radio networks are transitioning from 3G to 4G and adding more small cells, so the mobile operators must also upgrade their mobile backhaul from legacy TDM to Ethernet.
Tomi Engdahl says:
RIAA chief: ISPs to start policing copyright by July 12
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31001_3-57397452-261/riaa-chief-isps-to-start-policing-copyright-by-july-12/
Comcast, Time Warner and Verizon are among the ISPs preparing to implement a graduated response to piracy by July, says the music industry’s chief lobbyist.
The country’s largest Internet service providers haven’t given up on the idea of becoming copyright cops.
Last July, Comcast, Cablevision, Verizon, Time Warner Cable and other bandwidth providers announced that they had agreed to adopt policies designed to discourage customers from illegally downloading music, movies and software. Since then, the ISPs have been very quiet about their antipiracy measures.
Cary Sherman, CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America, said most of the participating ISPs are on track to begin implementing the program by July 12.
Tomi Engdahl says:
It’s the battery, stupid: The looming 4G smartphone crisis
http://pandodaily.com/2012/03/17/its-the-battery-stupid/
This week J.D. Power and Associates put out its 2012 smartphone customer satisfaction survey, and the results bear this out. The study shows that battery life is one of the most important factors in determining whether people love or hate their phones. Owners of 4G phones were less happy with their devices’ batteries than owners of 3G phones, mainly because 4G phones don’t live as long as 3G ones.
That underlines a looming problem in the smartphone business, one that will haunt every manufacturer and may undermine the post-PC revolution over the next few years: Every year, everything about phones keeps getting better—except the battery. In fact, that’s kind of the problem. Because manufacturers keep adding extra features to phones—especially more powerful processors, displays and networking—battery life remains stuck.
The move to 4G LTE phones will put this problem into stark relief.
Tomi Engdahl says:
With TV Everywhere, It’s All About Discovery
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/18/with-tv-everywhere-its-all-about-discovery/
200 million connected TV devices will cumulatively ship in the next 18 months, and combined with Xbox (23 million+ Live customers), PS3, Wii, and devices like Apple TV and Roku, about 300 million Connected TVs will be in living rooms in the next 18 months. That’s as many TVs connected to the Internet as Android devices in the market today.
In other words, the Connected TV ecosystem today is in a similar place to the Android ecosystem in mid-2010. Players like Netflix have already built billion-dollar businesses on Connected TV – Nielsen found that over 85% of Netflix streaming customers use Netflix on their living room TV.
Traditional media companies like HBO, Internet businesses like Hulu, and new startups have taken note of Netflix’s example and are rushing to plant their stake in the Connected TV ground. But just as mobile represented a brand new opportunity governed by new paradigms, and Eric Schmidt famously declared Google to be a “mobile-first” company, a new crop of “TV-first” companies will take full advantage of users’ unique TV behavior:
1. Discovery is the dominant paradigm on Connected TV.
2. Fragmentation is a massive challenge.
3. Appetite for content on the TV is higher than on any other connected device.
Unlike the desktop web, which is driven by “work usage” (quick snacks during the day), Connected TV usage is similar to tablet usage – users are accessing it for prolonged periods of time looking for long entertainment experiences (real sit down meals). As a result, the “TV” users are looking for a very different experience than the “web” users – they’re looking for a “real meal” experience that can keep them engaged for an hour, not a “snacking” experience they access during work.
But the TV opportunity isn’t just limited to Smart TVs – every screen is becoming a “mini-connected TV.” Tablet users are increasingly propping the tablet up a few feet away and leaning-back to watch video for an hour without touching the device
Tomi Engdahl says:
CIA Chief: We’ll Spy on You Through Your Dishwasher
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/03/petraeus-tv-remote/
More and more personal and household devices are connecting to the internet, from your television to your car navigation systems to your light switches. CIA Director David Petraeus cannot wait to spy on you through them.
Once upon a time, spies had to place a bug in your chandelier to hear your conversation. With the rise of the “smart home,” you’d be sending tagged, geolocated data that a spy agency can intercept in real time when you use the lighting app on your phone to adjust your living room’s ambiance.
“Items of interest will be located, identified, monitored, and remotely controlled through technologies such as radio-frequency identification, sensor networks, tiny embedded servers, and energy harvesters — all connected to the next-generation internet using abundant, low-cost, and high-power computing,” Petraeus said, “the latter now going to cloud computing, in many areas greater and greater supercomputing, and, ultimately, heading to quantum computing.”
Petraeus allowed that these household spy devices “change our notions of secrecy” and prompt a rethink of “our notions of identity and secrecy.” All of which is true — if convenient for a CIA director.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Free mobile apps ‘drain battery faster’
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17431109
Free mobile apps which use third-party services to display advertising consume considerably more battery life, a new study suggests.
Findings suggested that in one case 75% of an app’s energy consumption was spent on powering advertisements.
In the case of Angry Birds, research suggested that only 20% of the total energy consumption was used to actually play the game itself.
Of the rest, 45% is used finding out your location with which it can serve targeted advertising.
The tests were carried out by running the app over a 3G connection. The results noted that many apps leave connections open for up to 10 seconds after downloading information.
In Angry Birds, that brief period – described by researchers as a “3G tail” – accounted for over a quarter of the app’s total energy consumption.
Mr Pathak told the BBC that developers should perhaps think twice when utilising third-party advertising and analytics services in their app.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mobile biz bigwigs crack heads over Wi-Fi roaming charges
The tech was trivial, now paying for it gets tough
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/03/20/wi_fi_roaming_gsma/
The Wireless Broadband Alliance has joined forces with mobile operator clique GSMA to put the most important part of Wi-Fi roaming in place: ensuring that everyone gets billed properly.
Last month the alliance demonstrated how a telco could authenticate a customer roaming onto its Wi-Fi network using credentials stored in the SIM card and without the punter being aware of the transition. This was achieved by using Hotspot 2 technology, which allows a mobile handset (or tablet, or anything else) to automatically detect, connect to and register with a Wi-Fi base station.
Hotspot 2 hardware is now available from a handful of vendors. However, getting this gear to work is trivial compared to working out who should be paying whom for what, and this is where the GSMA comes in.
Updating that to include Wi-Fi roaming shouldn’t be terribly difficult, although the GSMA admits it will take a year to put all the pieces into place.
Tomi Engdahl says:
When It Comes To Phones, Men Are More Price-Sensitive (According to Vuclip)
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/19/when-it-comes-to-phones-men-are-more-price-sensitive-according-to-vuclip/
When men were asked about the most important factor when choosing a phone, the most popular answer (chosen by 33 percent) was price, followed closely by features (31 percent).
When women were asked the same question, the most popular answer was features (37 percent), followed by screen size (21 percent). Only 18 percent of women said that price was their biggest concern.
The survey received 560,000 responses total.
marine crane says:
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Video Speed Trap Lurks in New iPad
Users Find the Superfast 4G Link Carries a Big Cost: Churning Through Data Limits in Mere Hours
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052702303812904577293882009811556-lMyQjAxMTAyMDIwMDEyNDAyWj.html
Two hours of college basketball—which he viewed mounted to his car dashboard and live at tournament games—had burned through his monthly wireless data allotment of two gigabytes.
Mr. Wells will have to pay an extra $10 for every gigabyte above his current $30 subscription.
“It streams really fast video, but by streaming really fast video you tend to watch more video, and that’s not always best.”
The iPad’s new high-resolution screen and fast connection are specifically designed to spur greater use of online video—a long-stated goal for phone companies as well as technology purveyors such as Apple and Google Inc. Telecom companies in particular are banking on mobile video to drum up demand for their new, fourth-generation networks and create new revenue streams as they adjust to the smartphone age.
Verizon declined to comment on its pricing strategy, but said customers can pick higher-use plans or they can go easier on their data allotments by shifting to Wi-Fi networks when they are available.
What many consumers may not realize is the new iPad’s faster LTE connection means they will use more data even if they don’t change their 3G surfing habits. Take regular video: Verizon estimates that streaming it over an LTE connection runs through 650 megabytes an hour. That’s double the amount of data used streaming the same video over a 3G link, because the fatter pipe lets more data through.
On top of that, the new iPad’s sharper screen will encourage some users to view videos in high-definition, which uses 2 gigabytes an hour on a 4G connection, according to Verizon.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Sorry, carriers, 9 out of 10 tablets sold are Wi-Fi
http://gigaom.com/mobile/sorry-carriers-9-out-of-10-tablets-sold-are-wi-fi/
Approximately 90 percent of all tablets in the U.S. relied on Wi-Fi over 3G mobile broadband last year, according to industry analyst Chetan Sharma. In his most recent wireless market update report that summarizes the industry in 2011, Sharma suggests that carriers aren’t a needed distribution chain for slates; at least not yet.
Although mobile broadband networks are expanding in coverage and rising in speeds due to next-generation technologies such as HSPA+ and LTE, there isn’t a huge increase in the number of 3G-capable tablet sales.
This point gets back to a poll I ran just over a year ago, asking readers if 3G is needed in a tablet or if Wi-Fi is good enough. More than 1,300 responses came in with nearly 54 percent suggesting that Wi-Fi-only was more desirable. That’s a much lower result than Sharma’s sales figures, but with our more tech-centric readership, it’s not a total surprise.
For starters, a Wi-Fi device typically has a lower up-front cost; even the new iPad with with 4G LTE service adds $130 solely for the option of using mobile broadband. Second is the contract commitment of a 3G or 4G tablet.
But for all other tablets sold with mobile broadband connectivity, there’s typically a two-year contract as the carrier has paid for part of the hardware. That means consumers are paying for mobile data each month, whether they use it or not. And there’s another issue with this model: the device life cycle.
Contracts don’t make sense anymore
In other words, a tablet isn’t likely to be the first mobile broadband device one purchases. If true, it means that tablet owners are getting a second data plan with carriers, which isn’t appealing.
“Operators who start to bundle multiple devices by single data plans and data buckets are going to see a better yield in this category. We expect family data plans to be introduced in the US market soon.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Generating Revenue for the Application Explosion: What’s the Right Business Model?
http://www.readwriteweb.com/mobile/white-papers/generating-revenue-for-the-app/
Tomi Engdahl says:
US Wireless Market Update Q4 2011 and 2011
http://www.chetansharma.com/USmarketupdate2011.htm
The US market generated $67 billion in mobile data revenues in 2011 accounting for 39% of the overall revenues for the country. The mobile data market grew 4% Q/Q and 19% Y/Y to reach $18.6B for the quarter. For the year 2012, we are forecasting that mobile data revenues in the US market will reach $80 billion.
The US market accounts for 5% of the subscriber base but 17% of the global service revenues and 21% of the global mobile data revenues. It also accounts for 40% for the global smartphone sales.
Smartphones continued to be sold at a brisk pace accounting for 65% of the devices sold in Q4 2011. US Operators are averaging 80% of their postpaid sales as smartphones with Android dominating though iPhone leads in mindshare.
Clearly, tablets are selling better than the PCs (as our previous research has shown) both in units as well as the revenue. But so did the laptops compared to the desktops.
Tablet+Network+Cloud is an enormously powerful value proposition. It should be noted that apps and services on the mobile platform are defining the desktop environment now.
We will be dealing with multiple connected devices which share a common identity, cloud, media, security layer, and most importantly the apps and services. The traditional PC won’t disappear but our reliance on one single machine for creation or consumption will continue to dissipate.
In many developing nations, the PC era never arrived. They jumped right into the mobile computing era. They have always lived in the post-PC era. The implications are profound.
If we look at the US household IT spend, over 50% of that spend now goes to mobile. The life time value will increase for players who can tie experiences together across multiple screens in a seamless fashion.
Mobile data traffic growth continued unabated doubling again for the 8th straight year. We expect the mobile consumption to double again in 2012. Data now constitutes over 85% of the mobile traffic in the US. Approximately 30% of the smartphone users average more than 1GB/mo.
2011 was the most active year for mobile patents in terms of disputes. All the major players were active in filing and protecting their turf for the future battles.
While 2011 was the year of figuring what the opportunities are in the new connected era, 2012 is starting to focus on how to monetize those opportunities.
Tomi Engdahl says:
China Now Leads the World in New iOS and Android Device Activations
http://blog.flurry.com/bid/83261/China-Now-Leads-the-World-in-New-iOS-and-Android-Device-Activations
Flurry recently quantified China’s meteoric adoption of iOS and Android applications. While China ranked 10th in application sessions at the beginning of 2011, it finished the year in 2nd place, only behind the United States. With its large population and rapidly emerging middle class, adoption of apps vaulted China into the position of world’s 2nd largest app economy. In additional analysis, Flurry also determined that China has the most market upside, based on calculating those in China who can afford smartphones versus the current installed base.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Microsoft Says Windows Phone Will Pass Apple in China
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-21/microsoft-says-windows-phone-will-pass-apple-in-china.html
China is poised to become the world’s biggest smartphone market in 2012, making it crucial for manufacturers and sellers in the battle for sales. Shipments of the devices, used to download games and movies, will jump 52 percent to 137 million units in China this year, allowing the country to overtake the U.S. for the first time, research company IDC said.
Passing Apple is an “interim goal” as the company’s longer-term objective is to supplant Google Inc. (GOOG)’s Android as the local market leader
“We will continue to drive the price down,” Leung said. “Our goal is number one. Having a goal to be number two is not really a goal.”
Windows Phone will account for 7.5 percent of the China market this year, trailing the 12 percent share of Apple’s IOS and Android’s 70 percent, said Teck-Zhung Wong, a Beijing-based analyst at IDC. By next year, Windows share will rise to 15 percent, surpassing Apple’s 13 percent, while still trailing Android’s 66 percent, he said.
“The Windows Phone ramp-up in China won’t really begin until the second quarter, so the numbers are still low,” Wong said. “From next year the ramp-up will be more rapid.”
By 2016, Windows Phone is forecast to have a 20 percent share in China, ahead of Apple’s 16 percent and trailing Google’s 60 percent, Wong said.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Taking measure of OFC 2012 trends
http://www.edn.com/blog/Scope_Guru_on_Signal_Integrity/41687-Taking_measure_of_OFC_2012_trends.php?cid=EDNToday_20120321
it’s clear that the optical market is showing promising progress in both innovation and adoption of new technologies to improve bandwidth utilization.
First, 100Gb/s networking equipment using DP-QPSK modulation techniques was commonplace at the event. Also very prevalent around the show was SFP+ technology being deployed in 10Gb/s Ethernet systems.
On the “bleeding edge” at OFC, there were technology demos of 400Gb/s networking gear, along with previews of efforts to achieve terabit and even petabit speeds.
Crosstalk is a growing concern as multilane transceiver designs emerge to support 100G (10 by 10G and 4 by 25G) and 400G (10 by 40G) architectures. Crosstalk-aware jitter-analysis methods are being developed by test vendors to categorize crosstalk as a form of deterministic jitter.
Another measurement challenge emerging from developments at OFC is how to qualify coherent modulation schemes such as DP-QPSK for a better understanding of effective system performance (for example, effective BER).
Tomi Engdahl says:
Report: Nokia, Apple battle over ultra-tiny nano-SIMs
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/03/22/nokia_apple_sims/
Nokia is reportedly fighting the Apple-based proposal for a nano-SIM with designs of its own, aimed at preventing Cupertino scooping the patent fees which come with ratification.
Despite repeated enquiries, Nokia has failed to provide any confirmation or denial of the Financial Times’s report (behind paywall) that Nokia – concerned that Apple is poised to grab the lion’s share of patent revenue – has proposed an alternative design to the proposed nano-SIM technology to standards body ETSI.
It’s an interesting idea, though hard to credit as there’s no trace of such a filing at ETSI and in order to have its patents incorporated into a standard Apple would have to agree to FRAND (Fair, Reasonable And Non-Discriminatory) pricing.
Some very early GSM phones even used full-sized cards, tucked under the battery, but that quickly became impractical and the SIM as we know it (technically known as the Universal Integrated Circuit Card, UICC) became ubiquitous.
Apple wanted more space for the iPhone 4, and so took advantage of the largely ignored mini-UICC, which became known as the micro-SIM in order to create even more confusion. Micro-SIMs are now used in a handful of the slimmest smartphones, but to make them even slimmer Apple wants to trim off even more of the fat.
That has led to an Apple-led ETSI project to create a nano-SIM as much as 40 per cent smaller than the mini-SIM, including a marked reduction in depth which will make it a lot harder to trim an existing SIM with a pair of nail clippers.
If Nokia has indeed proposed an alternative nano-SIM, then the ETSI will have to decide which to incorporate as a standard.
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Tomi Engdahl says:
Mobile gaming wins in the bedroom
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57402977-93/mobile-gaming-wins-in-the-bedroom/
Where are most people playing mobile games? While commuting, waiting in line, or at work? Nope, it’s actually in bed.
Bedrooms are usually thought of as a place to sleep, read, relax, or do other things…. But, according to a new survey by social-game site MocoSpace, people are actually playing mobile games in the bedroom–at a staggering rate.
Of the 15,000 U.S. users surveyed by MocoSpace, 96 percent said they play on their mobile device while home and 53 percent of those are doing it in bed. Second place is the living room with 41 percent, then 5 percent in the bathroom, and 1 percent at the dining table.
This breaks a lot of preconceptions about where people are when playing on their smartphones.
“This report should make every console gaming company nervous,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Online video is overtaking physical sales
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2163210/online-video-overtaking-physical-sales
Americans will spend more online than in stores
MOVIE WATCHING AMERICANS are spending money on video streaming and downloaded film services, so much so that online sales there have overtaken physical ones.
Numbers from bean counters at IHS show that this will be the first year that online films and streaming services will take in more money than sales of DVD and Blu-ray discs combined.
There will be 3.4 billion legal and paid for movies watched in the US this year, around one million higher than hard copy sales.
“The year 2012 will be the final nail to the coffin on the old idea that consumers won’t accept premium content distribution over the Internet,” said Dan Cryan, senior principal analyst for broadband and digital media at IHS.
“In fact, the growth in online consumption is part of a broader trend that has seen the total number of movies consumed from services that are traditionally considered ‘home entertainment’ grow by 40 percent between 2007 and 2011, even as the number of movies viewed on physical formats has declined.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google patents mobile ads that sense noise, temp, light
Hey, you look cold – there’s a coat shop over there
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/03/23/google_mobile_ads_patent/
Google wants to deliver adverts based on the environment around people, as well as their behavioural profile, and has filed for a patent on the concept.
The premise of US patent 8,138,930 is that a phone, or other device, can detect a lot more than the current location of the user, it often knows the local temperature as well as the ambient sound and light levels, all of which the Chocolate Factory wants to use in order to better target advertisements.
The ideas outlined in the patent are pretty obvious – selling coats to people who are cold, advertising skiing holidays to those who are hot, or picking up the background noise during a call to establish one is attending a sports event – but the blogosphere is up in arms about the potential invasion of privacy despite the fact that Google is promising to let people opt out, and that it’s only a patent, or that this could easily be a step too far for the advertisers who fund the chocolate factory.
If one is using an Android phone then Google probably already knows where one is, and who one is, and has analysed one’s communications and browsing habits.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The new generation of smartphone sales tenfold in 2012
4G phones marketed in the LTE-phone sales tenfold this year, predicts market research firm Strategy Analytics.
This year is a 4G technology, a breakthrough in the market, Strategy Analytics said.
The research company forecasts that this year, sold 67 million LTE phone. Last year, the phones were sold to an estimated 6.8 million units.
Operators to market their technology LTE phones with 4G handsets. 4G will have an own, more advanced standards, but the LTE and 4G have already become synonymous in marketing.
- The mobile industry is going to a breakthrough year for 4G LTE technology. A number of operators and a number of phones distributors, to launch its LTE models for dozens of different countries, Vice President Neil Mawston from Strategy Analytics said.
Source:
http://www.taloussanomat.fi/informaatioteknologia/2012/03/23/uuden-sukupolven-alypuhelinten-myynti-kymmenkertaistuu-2012/201225913/12?rss=4
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google’s Don Dodge: The Smartphone War Isn’t Really A War (GOOG, AAPL, MSFT, NOK)
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2012/03/22/businessinsidergoogle-don-dodge-say.DTL
Technology companies are often positioned as winners and losers, but that’s not really the case, according to Google’s developer advocate Don Dodge.
For instance, Amazon’s Kindle can have a great future without killing tablets from Apple and Google, he said.
The market is so big that it’s ultimately up to developers to decide which platforms to develop for, he told us after he spoke at IGNITION West.
DD: Everyone wants to pick a winner and say iPhone wins and Windows Phone 7 loses. Or Amazon wins and somebody else loses. That’s really not the case.
If you look at the way Apple is approaching the smartphone business and the way Google is approaching the smartphone business — both companies are wildly successful, but are approaching it different ways. One doesn’t have to win for the other one to lose. So in the case of Amazon, I think they can have a very successful business, getting apps on Kindles. The phone app market will be predominantly on iPhone and Android.
BI: Did anything from the panel you were on (on mobile platforms and what consumers want) surprise you?
DD: The biggest surprise was that no one saw Windows or Blackberry or Symbian being able to gain significant market share. In the eyes of the people on the panel, it’s pretty much game over and it’s a war between Apple and Google. In my case, I don’t believe it’s a war at all. I believe Apple and Google can be very successful.
The market is growing so fast, it’s not that we are taking customers from Apple or Apple is taking customers from Google. The market is growing so fast, there is plenty of opportunity for both. For Microsoft, Blackberry, and Symbian, those players are in a very difficult position.
When you can do two platforms and cover 70 to 80 percent of the market, why should you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars more to get those last few percentage points?
Unless HTML5 becomes so popular and so powerful that you can just develop for HTML5, I think it will be difficult for the other platforms to get significant share.
Business Insider: So what’s the hottest trend you’re seeing in mobile?
Don Dodge: The big opportunities are in convergence. Companies have been successful with local, mobile, and games, but the next big trend is where you see the convergence of these.
Location is a big part of games. People like to play games where they can interact with their normal surroundings — places and businesses that they go to everyday. It’s the convergence of doing check-ins and making check-ins part of the game. You can only do it with a mobile phone. You can’t do it with a laptop or Facebook. There are a few examples like Life is Crime, MyTown, and TapCity, and a few others. They are starting to scratch the surface of a game that is centered around location. There’s a lot more to be done.
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Google Play problem: paying for ‘Angry Birds’ with battery life instead of money
http://www.theverge.com/2012/3/23/2896253/google-play-android-mobile-ads-angry-birds
Earlier this week, a report came out showing that some apps on Android use more than twice the power they actually need because they’re running ads.
At the center of the Android app ecosystem is a fundamental problem that hasn’t yet been solved: paid apps get better battery life but simply don’t make much money in Google Play, while free-with-ads apps appear to be much more profitable but provide a much worse experience to the end user.
If Angry Birds is the cipher through which to understand this problem, the result doesn’t look good for Google’s store or for Android as a platform. Google Play simply isn’t making much money for developers who offer paid apps on Android. Rovio’s “Mighty Eagle,” Peter Vesterbacka, says that until now “it just hasn’t made sense” to offer a paid version of Angry Birds on Google Play:
“The top developers offering paid downloads on Android, the numbers are single-digit millions at best. We are in the hundreds of millions on Android, so just it hasn’t made sense.”
That’s why, until now, Rovio only offered the ad-based version on Android Market, though the company did offer a for-pay version on Amazon’s Android app store.
Vesterbacka is cautiously optimistic, at best, that Google Play will be able to create real revenue for paid apps.
Tomi Engdahl says:
10 Things Kids Today Never Have To Worry About
http://www.buzzfeed.com/microsofthotmail/10-things-kids-today-never-have-to-worry-about-4iv0
Kids today have it pretty easy. Since missing TV shows and dealing with overcrowded inboxes have become a thing of the past, growing up just isn’t what it used to be. Take a look at some of the things kids will probably never have to think about again.
And the enabler that never have to think about again is IT and telecom.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mobile operators mourn death of embedded 4G
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/03/25/the_death_pf_embedded_4g/
Mobile operators are giddy at the prospect of doubling, tripling or quadrupling the number of devices connected to their networks over the coming years. Next generation portable devices such as tablets, laptops, cloudbooks and Ultrabooks are seen as candidates for 3G/4G integration that will help shore up the carrier position now that handset penetration has hit the saturation ceiling. However, considering that these gadgets will be used overwhelmingly on Wi-Fi networks, it’s difficult to justify integrating cellular functionality now that most consumers are walking around with a Wi-Fi hotspot in their pocket: their smartphone.
According to industry analyst Chetan Sharma, about 90 per cent of tablets sold in the US towards the end of 2011 were Wi-Fi only. This is not surprising considering the ubiquity of Wi-Fi. And for the occasions when Wi-Fi isn’t available, there’s tethering.
All major smartphone platforms now support tethering – the ability to share the phone’s mobile broadband connection – normally with up to five devices. Tethering effectively turns the handset into a Wi-Fi hotspot, using the 3G/4G connection as backhaul.
The beauty of tethering on these smartphones is the simplicity.
So the question is: why do I need a cellular modem inside my tablet or ultrabook, especially when integrated cellular broadband comes at a significant cost premium and normally requires an additional mobile data plan?
Admittedly, there’s a catch with tethering. A concessionary gifts which the likes of Apple and Microsoft and have made to mobile operators with their respective smartphone OSes is the ability to easily detect tethering activity, as well as the option to disable the tethering function. As a result, subsidised smartphones sold by carriers can have the tethering function hidden, unless the subscriber is on a tariff which allows tethering. Or the subscriber can be pushed onto a more expensive tariff if tethered usage is detected.
There’s something fundamentally wrong with operators charging for something I’m already paying for.
The tethering premium can be steep. In the UK I’m paying Vodafone an additional $8 a month to have tethering enabled on my iPhone, but AT&T’s premium in the US is $20. From my experience, tethering is policed by carriers with the iPhone, but less so with Android.
Amazon’s decision not to release a 3G flavour of its Kindle Fire tablet shows that Wi-Fi as the dominant use-case – with tethering as a Plan B – is accepted by OEMs.
Tomi Engdahl says:
In India fewer toilets than cell phones
http://www.hs.fi/ulkomaat/Intiassa+harvemmilla+k%C3%A4ym%C3%A4l%C3%A4+kuin+oma+k%C3%A4nnykk%C3%A4/a1305557811040
India, more people have their own cell phone at home in any kind of toilet or latrine.
Indian has 1 200 million households of whom 53 per cent owned a mobile phone.
At the same time, India’s 246 million households, less than half, or 47 per cent own their own toilet.
Television is already 47 per cent of families, the radio only one fifth.
Only a few people can access the Internet (according to the census 3.1 per cent last year).
Tomi Engdahl says:
Fingerprint-checking smartphone patent filed by Sony
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17490629
Technology to allow smartphones to scan their users’ fingerprints through their screens as an identity check has been patented by Sony.
It says an unidentified material would obscure the sensors so users would only see graphics telling them where to place their fingers.
Many technology analysts predict that mobile phones fitted with near field communication (NFC) technology will be used in place of credit cards to buy goods in the near future.
To feel safe with the idea consumers may demand that their phone’s security checks are more robust than a four-digit pin code.
Sony’s patent document suggests handsets with a camera sensor behind the screen would also be better for video conferencing,
It says the handsets could have bigger displays without increasing their overall size since they would not have to leave space for a camera at the top of the phone.
It adds that the move would also help to prevent the “uneasy feeling” created at present when users do not maintain “eye contact” because they are looking at each other images on their screens rather than directly into the phones’ cameras.
Apple filed for a patent four years ago to place a camera sensor in the centre of a computer screen so that users could naturally video conference with each other and take self-portrait pictures of themselves while looking at own their faces. It has yet to put the innovation to use.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nano-SIM war: here’s what Apple and Nokia want to put in your next phone
http://www.theverge.com/2012/3/26/2904153/apple-vs-nokia-4ff-nano-sim
28
inShare
Last week, Apple and Nokia got into a very public dust-up over the future of the SIM card — a staple in phones all around the world — thanks to a Financial Times article pointing out that the two had filed competing proposals with the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) for the so-called “fourth form factor (4FF) UICC,” more commonly known as the “nano-SIM.” The nano-SIM proposals seek to standardize a new SIM card that would be even smaller than the current micro-SIM popularized by the iPhone, freeing precious extra millimeters inside the phone’s chassis for more circuitry, more battery capacity, and slimmer profiles.
Apple suggests that the nano-SIM should effectively be a micro-SIM stripped of virtually all its plastic. Apple maintains the old configuration; in other words, with an adapter, you could theoretically use their nano-SIM in a micro-SIM or mini-SIM phone sold today.
The Apple proposal, being stripped of all plastic surrounding the contacts, requires some external holder to keep it in place.
Nokia and RIM take a very different approach:
The 4FF proposals from Apple’s competitors look more like microSD cards than present-day SIMs
Nokia points out that its proposal wouldn’t require a tray or other SIM carrier — in all likelihood, that means that the Nokia design has notches that would allow it to be held in place in a slot.
Apple offers royalty-free license to nano-SIM patents, a proposed standard backed by most European carriers
http://www.fosspatents.com/2012/03/apple-offers-royalty-free-license-to.html
Nano-SIM cards would be thinner and considerably smaller than micro-SIM cards. Apple has the support of “most of the European operators”, according to the FT. The two camps are heading for a showdown later this week (on Thursday and Friday) at the Smart Card Platform Plenary meeting of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) in Sophia Antipolis (Southern France).
A perfectly reliable source that I can’t disclose has shown me a letter dated March 19, 2012 that a senior Apple lawyer sent to ETSI. The letter addresses the primary concern of critics of the proposal. The FT said that “the Apple-led proposal has caused some concern among its rivals that the US group might eventually own the patents”. But Apple’s letter has removed this roadblock, if it ever was any, through an unequivocal commitment to grant royalty-free licenses to any Apple patents essential to nano-SIM, provided that Apple’s proposal is adopted as a standard and that all other patent holders accept the same terms in accordance with the principle of reciprocity.
Nokia lashes out at Apple’s royalty-free nano-SIM
http://news.idg.no/cw/art.cfm?id=2006908F-E352-3469-02E5D2AAC3587FF0
Apple’s royalty-free nano-SIM is an empty promise, because the company doesn’t have any essential patents related to its nano-SIM proposal, a Nokia spokesman said on Monday.
If there are patent claims essential to implement an ETSI standard, the organization would request that they be licensed under so-called fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms.
But Apple wants to go one step further. The company will grant royalty-free licenses to any Apple patents essential to nano-SIM, provided that Apple’s proposal is adopted as a standard and that all other patent holders accept the same terms, according to a letter that a source showed patent analyst and blogger Florian Mueller.
“We are not aware of any Apple Intellectual Property which it considers essential to its nano-SIM proposal. In light of this, Apple’s proposal for royalty-free licensing seems no more than an attempt to devalue the intellectual property of others,” a spokesman said via email.
Last week, Nokia detailed why its nano-SIM proposal is technically superior.
For example, it has completely different dimensions from today’s micro-SIM cards, while Apple’s proposed card has the same length as the width of current micro SIMs, and so would risk jamming if users tried to force it into devices, leading to card and product damage, Nokia said.
Also, Apple’s proposal requires a tray, which increases cost and takes up more room.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Akamai To Offer IPv6 To All In April
http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/03/26/2242208/akamai-to-offer-ipv6-to-all-in-april
“Akamai says that it will offer IPv6 services to its entire customer base beginning next month – a long-awaited move that is expected to be a major boon to the adoption rate of the next-generation Internet Protocol. Akamai hoped to release its production-grade IPv6 services by the end of 2011, but the task proved more difficult than originally anticipated.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nearly 1 Billion Smart Connected Devices Shipped in 2011 with Shipments Expected to Double by 2016, According to IDC
http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS23398412
The universe of smart connected devices, including PCs, media tablets, and smartphones, saw shipments of more than 916 million units and revenues surpassing $489 billion dollars in 2011, according to the International Data Corporation (IDC).
Looking ahead, unit shipments for smart connected devices should top 1.1 billion worldwide in 2012. By 2016, IDC predicts shipments will reach 1.84 billion units
In terms of platforms, IDC expects a relatively dramatic shift between 2011 and 2016, with the once-dominant Windows on x86 platform, consisting of PCs running the Windows operating system on any x86-compatible CPU, slipping from a leading 35.9% share in 2011 down to 25.1% in 2016. The number of Android-based devices running on ARM CPUs, on the other hand, will grow modestly from 29.4% share in 2011 to a market-leading 31.1% share in 2016. Meanwhile, iOS-based devices will grow from 14.6% share in 2011 to 17.3% in 2016.
“Android’s growth is tied directly to the propagation of lower-priced devices,”
“Smartphone growth will be driven by Asia/Pacific countries, especially China, where mobile operators are subsidizing the purchase of 3G smartphones, thus increasing the total addressable market.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mobile operators lost $58B in 2011 from faulty billing systems
http://venturebeat.com/2012/03/28/operators-lost-58b-fraud-billing/
Mobile operators across the globe lost more than $58 billion last year because of deficient billing systems, according to a new study from Juniper Research.
As carriers now support a wider array of devices than ever before, including iPhones, Android devices, BlackBerrys, and Windows Phones, and manage a crazy amount of traffic from these devices, the billing systems carriers use can’t keep up. With so many people with devices in hand and so many ways to process transactions, the scale of loss for operators has increased because there’s a much greater opportunity for fraudulent activity and bad debt.
“The systems in place now can’t identify accurately how this traffic is being processed,” study co-author Windsor Holden told VentureBeat.
The $58 billion in revenue lost last year equals out to more than 6 percent of the industry’s total revenue.
So what can carriers do to help remedy this problem? Juniper says they need to implement automated system solutions to “minimize the outflows resulting from next-generation connectivity.” Carriers also need to create a single repository of data to better track customer activity and integrate applications that can better track data on devices.
Holden suggests that as the mobile industry moves aggressively to deploy 4G LTE networks, carriers risk undermining revenue from value-added services by not investing in solutions to track data in real-time.
“In emerging markets, the emphasis has been on rapid expansion and not on things like preventing leakage,” Holden said.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Dell Ends Smartphone Sales in the US
http://www.pcworld.com/article/252824/dell_ends_smartphone_sales_in_the_us.html#tk.rss_news
Ending the Venue sales means Dell has discontinued all its U.S. smartphone brands, after entering the market in August 2010 with the Aero smartphone and Streak 5 combined tablet/smartphone.
Dell continues to sell smartphones outside the U.S. It sells the Venue Pro in India, the Venue in South Korea, a Streak smartphone in Japan, and Streak smartphones and tablets in China. The company also offers Streak tablets in some other countries.
“Mobility products have shorter lifecycles than laptops and desktops,”
“If you’re not a Motorola, RIM or Apple, people won’t take you seriously,” Gold said.
Dell could focus on Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 8 OS for tablets and might be better off reselling third-party smartphones, Gold said.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Cable surpasses telcos in the broadband subscriber race
In the U.S. broadband race, cable operators have the upper hand over traditional telcos, according to Leichtman Research Group’s latest report.
As the two largest U.S. telcos, namely AT&T (NYSE: T) and Verizon (NYSE: VZ) begin to wind down their respective U-verse and FiOS rollouts, cable operators have been happily attacking markets with their DOCSIS 3.0-based services with speeds ranging from 20-100 Mbps and triple play bundles.
These efforts paid off for cable operators as in 2011 they added a total of 2.3 million subscribers, or 75 percent of overall broadband additions in 2011.
By comparison, the top telcos only added 750,000 broadband subscribers in 2011.
“Despite a high level of broadband penetration in the U.S., the top broadband providers added 88% as many subscribers in 2011 as in 2010,” said Bruce Leichtman
Read more: Cable surpasses telcos in the broadband subscriber race – FierceTelecom http://www.fiercetelecom.com/story/cable-surpasses-telcos-broadband-subscriber-race/2012-03-20?utm_campaign=linkedin-Share-Web#ixzz1qVn4wZBr
Tomi Engdahl says:
The Solution To The Wireless Spectrum Shortage: More Wires
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ciocentral/2012/03/23/the-solution-to-the-wireless-spectrum-shortage-more-wires/
We’ve heard a lot recently about the pressing need for government action to free up more radio spectrum for wireless communications or to allow mergers or acquisitions purportedly aimed at the same goal.
But focusing on spectrum alone is unlikely to solve wireless network congestion in the long run. Spectrum is a finite resource.
A key factor in encouraging efficient use of spectrum has been largely overlooked in policy discussions. Wireless providers can add capacity, without obtaining more spectrum, by adding more and more antennas, generally referred to as cell sites. Additional cell sites allow the same spectrum to be used by even more consumers, subject to some well understood design considerations. Importantly, each additional cell site requires a wired connection to the global Internet.
So why don’t wireless companies pursue this seemingly obvious approach to adding more capacity? The answer lies in the economic self-interest of the two largest wireless companies, AT&T and Verizon. Because they control the supply of wired connections needed for each additional cell site, they can keep their competitors’ costs high for additional wired connections, and at the same time create a perception of scarcity for wireless services.
Consumers feel the impact through very high wireless data plan charges and caps imposed on usage, including throttling use of so-called “unlimited” data plans. Other wireless competitors pay artificially high prices for the wires connecting to their cell sites, transferring huge amounts of money directly to their main competitors AT&T and Verizon, which together already control more than 50 percent of the wireless market in the U.S. This economic transfer assures that the other wireless companies will be much less formidable competitors to AT&T and Verizon.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Google’s Android has generated just $550m since 2008, figures suggest
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/mar/29/google-earns-more-iphone-android
Android generated less than $550m in revenues for Google between 2008 and the end of 2011, if figures provided by the search giant as part of a settlement offer with Oracle ahead of an expected patent and copyright infringement trial are an accurate guide.
With roughly 200m Android devices having been activated to the end of 2011, including an estimated 90m during the past two years, it suggests that Google derives slightly more than $10 per Android handset per year.
That compares to Google’s $38bn total revenues in 2011, almost entirely derived from advertising on PCs, of which there are 1.25bn installed worldwide, according to Microsoft. That suggests an average revenue for Google of about $30 per PC per year, though not all will be capable of accessing the internet or will use Google, so the actual figure will be higher.
Google has never released figures for revenues it derives from the use of Android handsets, where it makes the software available to handset makers for free and generates revenues from adverts and app sales. The company declined to comment on the Guardian’s calculations, which it was shown ahead of publication.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Smartphones Account for Half of all Mobile Phones, Dominate New Phone Purchases in the US
http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/smartphones-account-for-half-of-all-mobile-phones-dominate-new-phone-purchases-in-the-us
Almost half (49.7%) of U.S. mobile subscribers now own smartphones, as of February 2012. According to Nielsen, this marks an increase of 38 percent over last year; in February 2011, only 36 percent of mobile subscribers owned smartphones. This growth is driven by increasing smartphone adoption, as more than two-thirds of those who acquired a new mobile device in the last three months chose a smartphone over a feature phone.
Overall, Android continues to lead the smartphone market in the U.S., with 48 percent of smartphone owners saying they owned an Android OS device. Nearly a third (32.1%) of smartphone users have an Apple iPhone, and Blackberry owners represented another 11.6 percent of the smartphone market.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Swedish Teleco Firms Looking Into Block VoIP Claiming Losses In Earnings
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/03/30/0253213/swedish-teleco-firms-looking-into-block-voip-claiming-losses-in-earnings
“Telia, a Swedish telecommunications company, is now looking into possible solutions to block free VoIP services like Skype and Vibr, claiming the losses are beginning to take its toll on the total earnings. Critics are saying the companies have wrongly implemented outdated pricing models, and the act could threaten net transparency and Independence. A new report from regulators of the European phone market shows that more and more telecommunications companies will block their subscribers from using free services. The European Commission is investigating whether it is possible to prohibit the blocking of legal services online.”
Why is it that when companies managed to reach a nice cushioned position they complain when the rules of the game change? this does not make sense to me.
You had all this time to profit and INNOVATE.
On one hand it’s understandable that after giving their users nearly unlimited mobile net they feel tricked when noone is paying them for phone calls anymore. On the other hand if it’s cheaper to make phone calls over Skype than it is in the traditional way that means that phone calls are hugely overpriced because Skype has strong security and much better sound quality than a phone call. In any case, they should have seen this coming and plan forward, transforming from telcos to mobile net companies.
Mobile operators seek to ‘block’ Skype in Sweden
http://www.thelocal.se/39938/20120328/
Swedish telecom operators want to implement technologies that will block mobile phone users in Sweden from making free calls using services like Skype and Viber.
A spokesperson for telecom service provider Telia told Sveriges Radio (SR) that the technology exists to block users’ ability to use mobile voice over IP (VoIP) telephony services.
“It’s going to mean that there will be service plans where it’s not included so it won’t work,” Telia spokesperson Charlotte Züger told SR.
“I believe, quite simply, that we need to be able to get paid for our various services no matter what, as different service plans include different things.”
A recent report by the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC), which oversees telecom regulations across the European Union, has found that Swedish telecom operators are not alone in their desire to prevent users from making free VoIP calls.
According to the European Commission, maintaining “net neutrality” – whereby all internet traffic is treated equally – is important and companies shouldn’t be able to control how customers use the network.
Tomi Engdahl says:
China is the world’s largest mobile phone market.
Over billion mobile subscriptions in China.
144 million of them are 3G
The number does not tell how many Chinese have a mobile phone, because many people who have mobile phone have several subscriptions.
There are also more Internet users than anywhere else, more than 500 million.
Fixed telephone lines continued to decline (284 million PSTN lines in February 2012).
Source:
http://www.ts.fi/uutiset/ulkomaat/329136/Miljardin+matkapuhelinliittyman+raja+ylittyi+Kiinassa
Tomi says:
IPv6 networking: Bad news for small biz
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/03/31/ipv6_sucks_for_smes/
IPv6 is traditionally a networking topic. Yet IPv6 is as much a business consideration as it is a technical one. As world IPv6 day rolls around again, we’re going to see an ever-increasing amount of technical IPv6 coverage.
IPv6 was neither designed for small biz nor consumers. IPv6 was designed by big-ticket network engineers bearing global infrastructure and enormous enterprise networks in mind.
. There are a lot more of us small and medium enterprises than big heavies. With IPv4 allocations gone we’re facing having to adopt a protocol with some significant flaws [PDF]. Well, flaws for normal people; they’re pretty much irrelevant if you have a big enough budget.
There is no NAT
The official answer is a combo deal. You must accept that renumbering is the new order. If you change ISPs and your assigned block changes then you must have every single computer, switch, router, printer, and network-attached doodad change with it.
No more static addresses, not even for servers. Everything should be configured by DHCP or stateless autoconfiguration. Whereas in an IPv4 world you created firewall rules for servers (and the applications they ran) by IP, in an IPv6 world your firewall will still work because all your systems should have proper fully qualified domain names.
tomi says:
NPT is a 1:1 form of NAT
You can use the firewall to map them 1:1 to an external block. So your server on the internal IP fd05:936e:4ab8::0024 can map directly to an external IP such as 2001:cdba:3257:9652::0024.
When you change ISPs you simply change the prefix configuration in the firewall without having to redo all of the rules, and without having to readdress a single network device. fd05:936e:4ab8::0024 now maps to 2001:556e:3311:abfc::0024
Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/03/31/ipv6_sucks_for_smes/
Tomi Engdahl says:
Police Are Using Phone Tracking as a Routine Tool
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/01/us/police-tracking-of-cellphones-raises-privacy-fears.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all
WASHINGTON — Law enforcement tracking of cellphones, once the province mainly of federal agents, has become a powerful and widely used surveillance tool for local police officials, with hundreds of departments, large and small, often using it aggressively with little or no court oversight, documents show.
The practice has become big business for cellphone companies, too, with a handful of carriers marketing a catalog of “surveillance fees” to police departments to determine a suspect’s location, trace phone calls and texts or provide other services.
With cellphones ubiquitous, the police call phone tracing a valuable weapon in emergencies like child abductions and suicide calls and investigations in drug cases and murders. One police training manual describes cellphones as “the virtual biographer of our daily activities,” providing a hunting ground for learning contacts and travels.
But civil liberties advocates say the wider use of cell tracking raises legal and constitutional questions, particularly when the police act without judicial orders.
“It’s terribly confusing, and it’s understandable, when even the federal courts can’t agree,” said Michael Sussman, a Washington lawyer who represents cell carriers. The carriers “push back a lot” when the police urgently seek out cell locations or other information in what are purported to be life-or-death situations, he said. “Not every emergency is really an emergency.”
“And the advances in technology are rapidly outpacing the state of the law.”
Tomi Engdahl says:
What Does A Post-UDID World Look Like For iPhone And iPad Developers?
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/29/apple-post-udid/
The need to move away from UDIDs, or an ID scheme that many developers rely on to power advertising and store data about their users, took on extra urgency after Apple issued a few app rejections related to UDID use over the past week and a half.
So this morning, apps are still getting through the approval process even if they access UDIDs, according to conversations with some of the ad and install networks. The distinction is that they need to disclose this fact to users and ask for permission.
What can you use instead? Here are a bunch of competing methods for generating IDs.
Device Fingerprinting: This is a way of generating an ID number from a number of characteristics about a user, like what kind of mobile browser they have, the device they’re using or their location. You need many parameters to generate enough combinations so there aren’t duplicates.
Copy-and-Pasteboard Method: “The copy and paste buffer is really meant for copying and pasting from function to function,”
HTML5 First Party Cookies:
This mimics what advertising networks have been doing for years on the desktop web to track users through cookies. If it were implemented in native mobile apps, you’d have to force the user to open a Safari browser window when they first open the app or click on an ad.
Wi-Fi MAC Address:
The MAC or media access control address is an identifier that’s assigned to networked devices (whether they’re smartphones or laptops). Like the UDID, it’s definitely unique to every device.
Wi-Fi MAC Address:
The MAC or media access control address is an identifier that’s assigned to networked devices (whether they’re smartphones or laptops). Like the UDID, it’s definitely unique to every device.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Maximizing savings at cell sites through deployment of hybrid energy solutions
http://www.eetimes.com/design/power-management-design/4370186/Maximizing-savings-at-cell-sites-through-deployment-of-hybrid-energy-solutions?Ecosystem=communications-design
And, a large and even less-recognized part of a successful cell site design is the power subsystem, both primary and backup.
The white paper “Hybrid Energy Deployment: What to Consider When Enabling Alternative Energy Sources at the Cell Site” from Emerson Network Power (a business of Emerson) is a detailed, technical look at these issues, complete with graphs, charts, analyses, discussion, and equations. It provides insight and recommendations for properly evaluating, selecting and operating smart hybrid-energy solutions
Tomi Engdahl says:
Exclusive: Google, Amazon, and Microsoft Swarm China for Network Gear
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/03/google-microsoft-network-gear/all/1
Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Facebook buy more networking hardware than practically anyone else on earth. After all, these are the giants of the internet. But at the same time, they’re buying less and less gear from Cisco, HP, Juniper, and the rest of the world’s largest networking vendors. It’s an irony that could lead to a major shift in the worldwide hardware market.
“My biggest customers were these big data center [companies], so I know all of them pretty well,” Liao says. “They all have different ways of solving their networking problems, but they have all moved away from big networking companies like Cisco or Juniper or [the Dell-owned] Force10.”
The move away from U.S. network equipment stalwarts is one of the best-kept secrets in Silicon Valley. Some web giants consider their networking hardware strategy a competitive advantage that must be hidden from rivals.
J.R. Rivers is one of the arms dealers. He runs a company called Cumulus Networks that helps the giants of the web — and other outfits — buy their networking hardware directly from “original design manufacturers,” or ODMs, in China and Taiwan.
“When Google looked at their network, they need high-bandwidth connections between their servers and they wanted to be able to manage things — at scale,” Rivers says. “With the traditional enterprise networking vendors, they just couldn’t get there. The cost was too high, and the systems were too closed to be manageable on a network of that size.”
So Google drew up its own designs — working alongside manufacturers in Taiwan and China — and cut the Ciscos and the Force10s out of the equation. The Ciscos and the Force10s build their gear with many of those same manufacturers. Google removed the middlemen.
The search giant does much the same with its servers, buying custom-built machines straight from Asia rather than going through traditional sellers such as Dell and HP.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Nearly 1 Billion Smart Connected Devices Shipped in 2011 with Shipments Expected to Double by 2016, According to IDC
http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS23398412
The universe of smart connected devices, including PCs, media tablets, and smartphones, saw shipments of more than 916 million units and revenues surpassing $489 billion dollars in 2011, according to the International Data Corporation (IDC).
“Whether it’s consumers looking for a phone that can tap into several robust ‘app’ ecosystems, businesses looking at deploying tablet devices into their environments, or educational institutions working to update their school’s computer labs, smart, connected, compute-capable devices are playing an increasingly important role in nearly every individual’s life,” said Bob O’Donnell, vice president, Clients and Displays at IDC.
In terms of platforms, IDC expects a relatively dramatic shift between 2011 and 2016, with the once-dominant Windows on x86 platform, consisting of PCs running the Windows operating system on any x86-compatible CPU, slipping from a leading 35.9% share in 2011 down to 25.1% in 2016. The number of Android-based devices running on ARM CPUs, on the other hand, will grow modestly from 29.4% share in 2011 to a market-leading 31.1% share in 2016. Meanwhile, iOS-based devices will grow from 14.6% share in 2011 to 17.3% in 2016.
“Android’s growth is tied directly to the propagation of lower-priced devices,”
“Smartphone growth will be driven by Asia/Pacific countries, especially China, where mobile operators are subsidizing the purchase of 3G smartphones, thus increasing the total addressable market. In many if not all instances, the smartphone will be the primary connection to the Internet,”
Tomi Engdahl says:
Mobile Operators: Creating Artificial Demand For Capacity?
http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/12/04/02/1852217/mobile-operators-creating-artificial-demand-for-capacity
If demand is high, prices rise. If demand is low, prices fall. Simple, but true; yet this concept can be manipulated artificially if, as seen with the latest projections of mobile operators, that higher demand means higher prices.
The gist seems to be: operators have no incentive to maintain good infrastructure because it costs money and the artificial scarcity of capacity allows them to charge more.
Tomi Engdahl says:
Wealthy smartphone users less likely to play games, tweet
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/02/us-app-wealthy-idUSBRE83108920120402
http://digg.com/newsbar/topnews/wealthy_smartphone_users_less_likely_to_play_games_tweet