ABI Research - Wireless Industry Blog Feed

Cisco Exiting the WiMAX Base Station Market

Fri, 5 Mar 2010 16:28:41 EST

Let me get my umbrella out first . . . the media will be cloudy with a high chance of impending-doom-for-WiMAX stories.
OK. Is this really a bad thing for the WiMAX ecosystem? No. This is good for the WiMAX ecosystem and good for Cisco.
This is good for the WiMAX ecosystem because:

Cisco was not aggressive in marketing its WiMAX base stations that it acquired from Navini
There is one less WiMAX base station vendor - more opportunity for Alvarion, Huawei, Motorola, Samsung, ZTE, nd other smaller players

This good for Cisco because:

WWAN RAN was outside of Cisco's core competency
Cisco was not getting any significant business - like ...

Apple sues HTC – it’s not an Android thing

Wed, 3 Mar 2010 10:28:16 EST

First and foremost, I would like to state that I am not a patent lawyer, nor do I intend to become one…EVER.

The Nexus One, Touch Pro, Touch Diamond, Touch Pro 2, Tilt II, Pure, Imagio, Dream, myTouch, Hero, HD2, Droid Eris are the models that Apple has decided are in violation of illegally using Apple Inc. IP.

Listed below are the devices and the operating systems that they run. Touch Pro – WinMo 6 Touch Pro 2 – WinMo 6.1 Touch Diamond - WinMo 6.1 Tilt II - WinMo 6 Pure – Winmo 6.5 Imagio – Winmo 6.5 Dream - Android (1.6 donut) myTouch - Android (1.6 donut) Hero – Android 1.5 (cupcake) HD2 – WinMo 6.5 Eris – 1.5 (cupcake) Nexus One – 2.1 (Éclair)

The first thing to note is that on the surfac ...

More WiMAX Products from Cellular Modem Vendors are a Sign of WiMAX Growth to Come

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 19:48:31 EST

Cellular modem vendors are typically the first companies to produce WWAN products based on the latest technologies. The newest WWAN air interfaces have always seen their introduction in external cellular modems first, followed by miniCards (mini-PCI in the past) for embeddeding into laptops (and now netbooks, MIDs, smartbooks, tablets, e-readers, etc. as well). Sierra Wireless launched its OverDrive 3G/4G Mobile Hotspot on Sprint's network last month. Novatel Wireless announced its MiFi Intelligent Mobile Hotspot with WiMAX, which should be shipping in the second half of 2010.

The fact that the large cellular modem vendors are entering the market is a sign - among other signs and proof - that the WiMAX market ...

Scribd Unveils Mobile Strategy for Online Document Viewing

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 14:54:26 EST

Known for being an online repository of electronic documents -- self-published books, marketing presentations and brochures, and clippings from other Internet sources -- Scribd claims more than 10 million online documents on its servers. The company recently unveiled a campaign to address mobile users that want to access Scribd documents on these handheld browsers along with emerging eBook Reader devices. Can the company pose a challenge to electronic booksellers Amazon or aggregators like Apple to view electronic content on a broader range of mobile devices?

Today at the Mobile World Congress, some of the world’s largest MNOs got clever about mobile applications.

The Wholesale Applications Community initiative, backed by 24 MNOs from across the globe have unified themselves behind the idea of a single platform where mobile application developers can come and access a broad range of mobile subscribers, theoretically the largest addressable market for mobile applications on the planet. While this initiative is a long ways from becoming a reality, if the MNOs get it right, by 2011 we might see mobile application developers flock to the platform.

AT&T selects ALU and Ericsson for their LTE rollout – what are the network infrastructure implications?

Wed, 10 Feb 2010 08:33:16 EST

In the run up to MWC and the flurry of announcements that are starting to already pour in, AT&T has announced that they will be going with ALU and Ericsson for their LTE rollout. Here is the press release. Commercial services are scheduled to begin in 2011.

While Verizon had taken the opportunity to announce their LTE vendors at MWC 2009, AT&T is doing the same this year. The interesting part is that AT&T have chosen the same vendors as Verizon. Having chosen to go with ALU and Ericsson was somewhat expected as both vendor's 3G kit is present in AT&T network.

Mobile Apps Beware -- Rapidly Accelerating Mobile Touch Web Is Perfect Example of Mobile Cloud Computing

Thu, 4 Feb 2010 14:59:41 EST

On Wednesday (Feb 3), mobile analytics firm Taptu http://www.taptu.com released a new metrics report detailing the size and characteristics of a new breed of mobile website – the mobile touch website. These sites are optimized for touchscreen devices with finger-friendly layouts and lightweight pages which are fast to load over mobile networks. According to Taptu, there are currently more than 326,000 of these mobile touch websites. In recent estimates, there are less than 200,000 mobile apps available for from iPhone, Android, Ovi and Blackberry app stores.

KDDI selects Airvana and Hitachi for femtocell trials

Tue, 2 Feb 2010 08:47:43 EST
KDDI, Japan’s second biggest operator has finally come clean on femtocells. This after their two main competitors Softbank and NTTDoCoMo already having launched commercial femto services. For details of the launch here is the link to the press release http://www.airvana.com/news/news_1011.htm

The one big difference between KDDI and the others is that KDDI is a CDMA operator. I don’t necessarily really see this as having hampered vendor selection as the CDMA space has a number of suppliers including Airvana, Motorola, Airwalk, Alcatel Lucent and Samsung.

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Apple Joins the Media Tablet Fray with iPad Launch

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 15:37:33 EST

Apple Inc today announced the iPad media tablet. The media tablet device category, which began to gain traction in 2009, will come into its own during 2010 and beyond.

“While laptops are focused on productivity, and mobile phones are still primarily about communication, the main focus of media tablets is entertainment,” says ABI Research senior analyst Jeff Orr. A new ABI Research study on media tablets forecasts 4 million devices will be shipped worldwide this year.