Archive for April, 2009

Apple App Store Hits 1 Billion Downloads!

Thursday, April 23rd, 2009

iphone-app-storeThat’s right, about 20 minutes ago Apple’s App Store crossed an amazing threshold.  They have now had over 1 billion applications downloaded in their first nine months of existence.  This is a phenomenal feat for any company, even one with the marketing prowess of Apple.  While mobile applications have been in existence for well over a decade, nobody else has generated the interest in applications that Apple and the iPhone have.

If you want a little more information on them reaching the 1 billion mark, check out this web site.  There are links on that page for the top 20 paid apps, and the top 20 free apps of all time.  Some of the ones that made the list are almost as amazing as the record itself.  Hang on tight now.  This whole “application thing” is just getting started.  Congratulations, Apple!

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CTIA, The Final Installment - Femto What?

Tuesday, April 21st, 2009

One of the technologies that was scattered out across the exhibitor area at CTIA, is a device called a femtocell.  What is a femtocell, you ask?  Think of it as a miniature cell tower connected to your broadband connection at home.  Here’s how it works.  You connect the femtocell to your cable or DSL modem at home and then you throw away your land line.  That’s right, open up the trash compactor, toss in your old home phone, and turn the compactor on.  You don’t need it any more. 

femtocellNow turn on your cell phone.  In fact, everybody at your house can turn on their cell phone.  As long as you are in the house, the femtocell works as your cell tower.  You can make and receive regular cell calls, but instead of going over the regular cellular network, they go to the femtocell, and then over your broadband connection.  I bet several of you already using parts of this technology.  At my house we all have cell phones, and we contract with our cable provider for our home phone service which goes over our broadband connection already via a technology know at Voice Over IP (VOIP).  So we have the two end pieces, but not the device that lets us use our cell phones over that broadband connection.

So why would you want to do this?

  1. First of all, you will get better cell coverage in your house.  I don’t know about you, but most folks call me on my cell anyway, whether it be for work or personal use, and I don’t get the greatest reception in my house.  How would you like four bars?  A femtocell can deliver that.
  2. You will save money.  I pay about $50 or so for a home phone line that I basically rarely use.  In fact, the primary people that call us on it are telemarketers.  Don’t really need those calls do you?  A femtocell is typically a fixed price service that is under $20 depending on how many lines will use it.
  3. You will save minutes on your mobile plan.  As long as your are on your femtocell, the minutes typically do not count against your plan minutes.

Believe it or not, more and more people are ditching their home phones anyway.  Clint posted an article a few weeks ago on MobileBizBuzz about how Oklahoma is leading the way in this trend.  Oklahoma has 26.1% of households who are mobile only.  That means they have no home phone (landline).  That is number 1 in the nation. 

What is so important about this trend?  The more people ditch their home phones, the more we are drawn toward a world that is completely mobile from a technology perspective.  In fact, it is already becoming a part of the fabric of our lives.  Check out your teenagers, and you will see most of them communicate primarily via their cell phone via text, voice, or even Facebook.  Mobility continues to move forward, and femtocells are just one more catalyst accelerating that move.

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CTIA Part 3 - 4G is Faster Than a Scalded Dog

Monday, April 13th, 2009

I’m not sure how much attention people in general actually pay to some of the terms those of us in the wireless industry use.  Let’s try this one for starters: 3G.  I’m guessing some of you probably have heard this and have a decent idea what it means, at least generally.  This knowledge is probably based on the likes of the new 3G iPhone.  3G is basically a general term used to refer to a set of faster wireless network technologies and protocols that have been in the market for the last 2-3 years.  If you have a cell phone with Sprint or Verizon, the incarnation you might be familiar with is EVDO or DO.  If you use AT&T, you may have heard the term HSPA.  I’ll spare you what the acronyms means, but in a nutshell the practical meaning of 3G is that each of us can get faster network access to our wireless devices.

For instance, if you have a 3G iPhone, you’re web pages will download faster (actually quite a bit faster), than if you have the original iPhone.  For those of you who travel like me, you might have an Air Card for your PC that lets you tap into one of the existing 3G networks.  It’s not as fast as your cable modem at home, but it’s way faster than previous wireless modems, and light years ahead of your 56K modem at home if you’re still stuck with that.

This year at CTIA many booths, and some of the speakers, featured the next generation of wireless network technologies: 4G.  4G, like 3G, comes in a couple of primary flavors.  You will begin to hear the terms WiMAX and LTE more and more over the next 2-3 years.  4G is the more generic term, and WiMAX and LTE are specific technology implementations.  Big deal, so what?  What does it mean to you, you ask?  The answer is simple: speed!

Let me try and paint a picture for you here.  If you currently have a cable modem at your home or place of work, you are probably experiencing on average somewhere aroundrunning-great-danes 4Mbit.  That means your computer is receiving 4 million bits each second from the network.  I average around this at my house, and I find this is fairly typical, though I do have friends that average closer to 7Mbit.  My point here is not to give you a specific speed, but to give you a frame of reference.  Now step forward with me into the world of 4G.  Imagine getting network access from your 4G iPhone (if it existed), or your 4G enabled laptop at something closer to 15Mbit to 20Mbit.  That’s somewhere around 4 or 5 times what you are getting in your home today, and it is what one presenter experienced in Portland recently when they did a 4G speed test.  That’s faster than a scalded dog, as we say where I’m from.

Think about it.  Speed like that really changes things.  From a personal perspective you could be riding down the road while your spouse is driving and watch a streaming TV show from Hulu.  You could even watch your favorite sport live through a number of on-line sites, all without jitter or delays.  From a business perspective that type of speed changes things dramatically.  Got a huge spreadsheet you need to review, or a large presentation you are updating?  No problem.  You’ve got speed that is as good or better than most of us experience in our offices.  Once that happens, we really will be able to do things any time, any place, anywhere.

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CTIA Part 2 - The Rise of the Machines

Friday, April 10th, 2009

No, it’s not some Sci Fi movie, but machines were a focus of CTIA this year. In the South Hall of the Vegas Convention Center, CTIA had a sizeable area of about 30 companies involved in wireless Machine to Machine (M2M) technologies. In addition to this, other booths throughout the show had an M2M focus, and Verizon had an entire booth devoted to assisting people getting new hardware devices certified on the Verizon network (including a strong M2M focus).

For those of you who don’t know, M2M is all about a machine monitoring some set of variables, and reporting over a wireless network to another computer. Sometimes commands are sent back to the device over the cellular network so that it can take some type of action. Semi trucks have had this for a number of years. Small computers reside on many big rigs and monitor everything from speed, to when the next oil change is required. This information is then communicated over a wireless network to a computer at some headquarters location, where it is examined, and where a human will be notified if certain events or thresholds occur.

So what does this have to do with business, especially the small and medium businesses that make up the majority of our economy? Well, as devices become smaller and smaller, this type of technology will play an increasingly large role in our businesses and personal lives.  Let’s assume for a moment you have a company that focuses on home healthcare. Imagine that some of your patients need more than just a daily monitoring of vitals. Maybe they ideally should be monitoried 3 or 4 times a day.

Dr. Eric Topol spoke in one of the CTIA keynotes and pointed out several M2M implementations that allow remote monitoring of vitals wirelessly through an intelligent bandage. No, it’s not Star Trek.  It’s becoming reality today.  The video shows an animation of how one of these types of devices works.

If produced inexpensively enough this same type of technology might monitor your air conditioner at home, and phone your HVAC repair service if problems are detected. The OnStar service provided on GM cars already provides this type of service on vehicles. Think about your own business, and imagine what you could do if you were able to monitor equipment, vehicles, people, or processes remotely. This whole world of mobility has so much to offer beyond ringtones and wallpaper for your cell phone.

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Posted in Mobile Apps, Mobile Devices, Mobile in SMB | 1 Comment »

What’s a Dell To Do?

Thursday, April 9th, 2009

PalmDellLogoRumors have long circulated that Dell would be entering the smartphone market. As far as rumors go, that one seems believable. After all, they’ve gone from making personal computers out of a garage to becoming a massive manufacturer/distributor of desktop computers, laptops/notebooks, netbooks, monitors, servers, storage component, etc. They even had a (not so well receivied PDA, the Axim, in 2007). Why not get in the smartphone market now?

Well, it sounds like they have been trying to do just that. Unfortunately, the prototypes they’ve been shopping around seem to have been, well, boring. In other words, no iPhone killers. In fact, the only rumored iPhone killer that anyone is even talking about is Palm’s new Pre. So what’s a Dell to do? Wait…I have an idea! Dell should buy Palm! While that move wouldn’t guarantee Dell’s success, some analysts think it is a good idea. In fact, it may be the only reasonable way for Dell to enter the market this late in the game. Regardless, if Dell is serious about jumping in, they have one heck of a hill to climb.

What do you think? Should Dell go it alone or should they buy Palm? Here’s some more information to help you craft your thoughts:

palmdelllogoxsmallMichael Dell hints at smartphones, mobile Internet devices - InfoWorld
palmdelllogoxsmallDell’s iPhone Killer rejected by carriers as too dull - AppleInsider
palmdelllogoxsmallMore details on Dell’s supposed smartphone - CNet
palmdelllogoxsmallA Dell Smartphone Would Face Big Hurdles - Business Week
palmdelllogoxsmallPalm Pre a Bump in Dell’s Smartphone Road? - Pre Central
palmdelllogoxsmallHandoff: Why Dell Needs to Buy Palm Now - Fast Company

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CTIA Wireless 2009 and the Watch Phone

Tuesday, April 7th, 2009

I just got back from CTIA Wireless 2009 last week.  CTIA is the International Association for the Wireless Telecommunications Industry.  So what does that mean to you if you don’t work in the industry?  Well, it’s a chance to see what is going on the industry and what types of focus you’ll see out of providers throughout the 2009 calendar year.  We always send at least one person from MacroSolve to the show.  I was already traveling to see some of our partners last week so it was natural for me to stop in and see what was up.

I always find the show interesting, not for specific products or technologies that are displayed, but for the trends you can see if you just pay a little attention.  Since it’s been a couple of weeks since I posted, I thought I would write up a series of posts on some of the more interesting things I saw.

Let’s start it out with one of the coolest gadgets I have seen in a long time.  Any of you remember the Dick Tracy watch?  Well, it is alive and well in a new product from LG.  Take a look at the video below if you’d like to see more about it.  In a nutshell, it is a small, but very functional watch phone.  It has a full color touch screen, a speaker phone, MP3 player…the works.  It was actually announced at CES in January, but this was my first time to see it in person.

We focus on mobility in business in this blog, so why am I bringing the watch phone up here?  Obviously it’s a really cool device, but how does it apply to business?  I’m not sure it does apply specifically to business, but there is a reason for mentioning it.  That reason is miniaturization.  The more cellular, and related technologies shrink, the more pervasive they will became in devices other than just cell phones.  Check back in over the next day or so, and I’ll have some observations on how businesses will be impacted by cellular technologies making their way into a realm known as Machine to Machine.  Miniaturization is just one trend that is enabling the Machine to Machine world.

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