I attended my latest demo for BlackBerry 10 this week, and I remain [client access only] impressed by the platform’s features and general look. The highlights include a seemingly smart, learning (Swype-style) keyboard, a compelling and very HTML5-ready browser, the ability to sandbox the device’s personal and professional uses into BYOD-friendly and easily changeable identity modes, as well as a whole new approach to multi-tasking. I also remain equally concerned by its main problem – the fact that it’s not ready, being now scheduled for Q1 2013. But all in all, the bits I like in BB10 are enough to make me give RIM the benefit of doubt and assume that the platform could make an impact upon its release.
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It does look like SoftBank and Sprint are making a coherent case for the technical and market synergies of their merger. Nevertheless it is really quite a bold move for a Japanese mobile operator.
NTT DoCoMo has made a number of strategic investments in Asia (e.g. TATA Teleservices in India) in recent years but it got its fingers burnt in the cellular and dotcom boom. NTT DoCoMo tried to enter the international mobile operator licensing/purchasing/investment market too late. In 2001, NTT DoCoMo invested around US$ 10.2 billion in then known, AT&T Wireless Services Inc, in an attempt to encourage adoption of its then more advanced wireless services (remember iMode handsets being introduced into the US market?). NTT DoCoMo was having considerable success with its iMode services in the Japanese market and NTT DoCoMo tried to spur the adoption of its iMode mobile data technology in a number of international markets through investment and/or joint venture marketing and supply of handsets.
iMode failed to capture the imagination of the US consumer. The technology only had limited success and NTT DoCoMo had to discretely withdraw from a number of markets.
SoftBank may have more success than NTT DoCoMo, as it is not evangelizing a ‘walled garden’ business model and technology.
MNOs Protectionism Around NFC Will Come Back To Haunt Them (Again!)
Oct 10, 2012 12:00:00 AM / by Admin
So we are nearing the end of 2012 and I am still waiting to see real movement amongst the operator community that was making noises all last year about NFC payments and mobile wallets taking off. Not only that, but they have largely blocked anyone else from going it alone too.
Yes , there are some mitigating circumstances, the EU monopolies investigation into Project Oscar in theUK was a big factor, but even then there could have been seeding of handsets and SIMs and other progression.Google Wallet went 2.0 and is certainly an improvement, having much wider support and engagement from the banks and card issuers. Is this the only reason it hasn't gone bigger? And the reason that no other NFCpayment providershave been able to enter the market?
To me the MNO positionstrikes meas oneof an industry that is worried. To date, MNOs have held back from rolling out NFC and seeing what happens. They are worried that to do so will open up the market for other players. Maybe it wouldbut as it stands the delays andprocrastinationis putting off partners and allowing a different form of competition to enter the market. Such protectionism hasn't worked in the past (walled gardens anyone?) and I see no reason why this occassion will be any different.
Operatorspotential partnersandB2B clients do not want to tie themselves into a business model and pricing strategy that is not entirely fair and equal. Some flexibility and lateral movement is needed to stimulate their interest and attract customers. If anything, retailers want to get away from the 4-party model and interchange fee system that they find expensive and less justifiable. What can they do to appeal to them? No-one has shown the retailers that NFC will produce returns for them. No-one (with the exception ofone or two players)has developed platforms offering VAS that will appeal to retailers. This seems like a role that MNOs could fill.
In the meantime alternative means of mobile payments are creeping in and some majorretailers are launching their own payments combined with their loyalty programs. Amazon and PayPal are increasing their presence instores and McDonalds has followed the lead taken by Starbucks. These companies have the scale todo so and have identified the potential of mobile.
It is a shame that the MNOs do not have the same level of confidence because if they continue to dither then they will miss out on a lucrative new revenue stream. The OTT players move much faster and focus on building scale before monitising their services. The MNOs have left the door ajar and these companies will slam it open if things continue to remain in limbo. The next 6-9 months will be critical in how this market develops.
The National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) of Thailand has trimmed down the maximum amount of frequency a carrier can purchase in the upcoming 3G auction from 20 MHz to 15 MHz.
With 45 MHz to go around, the tightened limit implies that the big three – namely Advanced Info Service (AIS), Total Access Communication (DTAC), and True – can now secure an equal share of the pie quite easily. The NBTC hopes that reduced competition will translate into lower spectrum acquisition costs for carriers and hence more affordable 3G services for consumers.
However, the Thailand Development Research Institute (TDRI) describes the wireless industry as "a profit-maximizing monopoly dominated by three operators" and contends that the 3G service tariff will therefore probably be steep anyway. Meanwhile, the government will not earn as much as it could from the auction.
The NBTC counters that competition for the scarce resource will still be healthy, because the 45 MHz is split into nine slots that are not homogenous. Operators will therefore be fighting for optimal slots with the least interference. In addition, the Chief Executive Officer of AIS has indicated that slots adjacent to those currently occupied by the Telecom of Thailand (TOT) are more desirable due to the possibility of future strategic business partnerships.
So who is right? Our recently published Insight takes a look at the impact of this policy revision.
Stepping up security efforts in mobile health and medical devices
Oct 5, 2012 12:00:00 AM / by Admin
Until recently, security issues in the mobile health space have remained fairly narrow in scope. Primary considerations have focused on potentially defective software and firmware, battery life or interference caused by electromagnetic signals. However, mobile health is evolving from a niche market to a more mainstream one, alongside the snowballing adoption of smart devices. This growth has popularized mobile health apps and boosted the development of consumer-oriented health sensors and peripherals for smart devices. Governments have started paying more attention to the security context of mobile health, both from a network and software perspective.
The US Government Accountability Office (GAO) just released a report on medical devices, encouraging the Federal Drug Administration (FDA) to expand information security considerations for certain types of medical devices. The report acknowledges the FDA’s past efforts in addressing risks from unintentional threats, but now stresses that the FDA must start to seriously consider intentional threats as well. The report highlights three key intentional threats to active implantable medical devices (such as pacemakers and insulin pumps): unauthorized access, malware and denial of service attacks. The report emphasizes that as technology evolves and devices become more complex, the risk potential is likely to increase. The GAO concludes by setting down some basic starting recommendations for the FDA, including actively investigating information security problems. The full report available here.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the European Commission Director General for Communications Networks, Content and Technology recently endorsed a European Directory of Health Apps. Produced in cooperation with the European Health Forum, the directory is a result of an extensive consumer and patient group survey of 200+ mobile health applications across 62 specialties and in 32 different European languages. Although not strictly focused on security aspects, the Directory certainly goes a long way in providing a resource for tested and authenticated apps. Sifting through the innumerable health apps on app stores and validating their reliability is not always evident for the individual end user. The Directory can provide a trust-worthy source of information on a number of health-related apps, paving the way to further efforts on authentication and validation in the mobile health space. The Directory can be accessed here.
These two separate efforts clearly show that mobile health is a maturing space, and therefore one that is likely to attract malfeasors. Considerations in terms of device/network security and app authentication are critical in the context of health, and there’s no doubt that there is significant potential for targeted security solutions in this area.
Could Operators be Considering Deploying LTE FDD and LTE TDD at the Same Time?
Oct 2, 2012 12:00:00 AM / by Admin
LTE TDD, or the “Time Division Duplex” variant of 4G LTE, has been steadily gaining momentum over the past year or so. The number of commercial deployments has surpassed 10, and 36 more are either in commercial roll-out or trials. There are signs that not only are a number of greenfield LTE operators considering LTE TDD, but also by a number of incumbent mobile cellular operators.
One of the reasons for the interest in LTE TDD has been the commitment to support both LTE TDD and FDD on the same chipset for mobile devices. It should help to drive economies of scales for mobile device production for both operator deployments. But there is an additional dimension: LTE operators may even secure blocks of spectrum for FDD and TDD LTE operation within their own market. Why? Because a mobile operator can use LTE TDD, and FDD, to expand coverage and/or capacity within their own network.
SK Telecom, in conjunction with Ericsson and Altair Semiconductor, has developed handover technology that confirms handover between FDD LTE and TD-LTE can be as seamless as handover on single FDD mode between different bands. LTE TDD, instead of being a bit-part player on the 4G stage may be rapidly evolving into playing a major supporting role.
On the 28th September 2012, the USA’s FCC announced it would be conducting a rather unique auction in 2014 to help alleviate an impeding spectrum crunch that is looming from the burgeoning adoption of 3G- and 4G-enabled smartphones, tablets, automotive vehicles, machine-to-machine modules, and other enterprise and consumer electronics.
The USA has been on the forefront of innovative regulatory policy. In the 1990s, the FCC applied Game Theory to ensure optimal price setting for PCS and AWS spectrum licenses. Now the FCC intends to set up an Incentive Auction that allows broadcast television spectrum to be repurposed for mobile broadband by offering the broadcasters financial incentives to relinquish some, or all, of their spectrum assets.
While the date for the FCC’s Incentive Auction is set for 2014, the FCC is still in the process of soliciting consultations from interested parties. It is certainly an innovative procedure and one that may well be emulated by a number of state spectrum regulators as a mechanism to arbitrate between incumbent and prospective spectrum stake-holders – not just in the mobile cellular industry but also potentially other industries that occupy wireless spectrum.
Mobile has become the new playground for cybercrime, and so far, malware is having a field day. The migration of traditional PC-based threats, such as Trojans, spyware and spam, to the mobile platform is not surprising. The popularization of mobile operating systems such as Android, and the general lack of public awareness, has enabled malware to multiply exponentially over the past year.
Cybercriminals view mobile as another lucrative platform to exploit. And they are not the only ones. Mobile is attracting shady and unscrupulous parties employing any number of dubious practices: intrusive advertising, unauthorized data collection, government surveillance and corporate espionage.
The problem is that end-users do not view smartphones and tablets as posing any serious security risks. At best, they see the loss or theft of a device as an inconvenience or financial set-back. Organizations are slightly more conscious of the dangers but mostly think in terms of protecting corporate information and avoiding serious data breach.
Mobile devices however, need to be considered in a much broader light. Capable of a great number of functions, they are susceptible to similar threats as their desktop counterparts: phishing scams, ID theft, financial fraud, takeover by a botnet and infection by other crimeware. As mobile devices evolve and become more sophisticated, so will mobile threats. End-users need to start paying more attention now to how they use their phones and what they are installing on them.
There are a ton of mobile security solutions on the market, from simple anti-theft and antivirus apps to more inclusive mobile management services. The mobile security market has become serious business, and competition is set to heat up in the coming year. These issues are discussed in further detail in our recently published Analysis on mobile application security. Further discussion on whether organizations need mobile security can be read in our Insight.
A few points on the blowout following the launch of Apple Maps:
There have been rumors for months that the beta version wasn’t up to scratch so Apple must have known there would be issues. There is another side to this story and it may well be that Google has intelligently forced Apple to play its hand a little earlier than it would have wanted.
Questions have to be asked about the effort Apple has placed on developing a complete solution. Google continued to utilize TeleAtlas maps (up until last year in Europe) to buy itself time to develop a solution. Apple has been acquiring in this space since 2009, giving it ample time to do the same. Instead it has had to rely on third parties to fill the major gaps in its offering.
Don’t blame the partners: Multiplication of sources is essential in building geodata now, its how this data is aggregated and analyzed that defines the services. Look at Google - it combines a variety of sources such as Census data, geographical survey data, Map maker, user data, street view cars, etc. However, Google (and Nokia) have a huge advantage in that much of its data is sourced internally, making it much easier to build from the ground up.
Maps are not about TBT navigation anymore: As the use and value of maps is now moving to local search it is the ability to accurately source, georeference, index and aggregate dynamic data (often duplicate) in a searchable way that will define the winners and losers.
Errors are an inevitable and ongoing part of building maps/geodata: This is why services like TomTom’s MapShare and Google’s Map Maker exist. People forget that Google had similar problems and it has taken time for it to get to where it is today. It hasn’t helped Apple that there have never been so many people to catch so many mistakes in such a short space of time, with so many mediums on which to broadcast them.
Apple is a master of public relations, but it can’t hide the fact that this is a service that has taken others years to optimize. To catalyze the process, it may need to reassess its current geodata aggregation strategy and the resources assigned to this area, which may lead to a round of high profile hiring and acquisition. It’s also vital that it starts incorporating the millions of users of Apple products in a way that will sharpen the data quickly as well as enabling businesses to submit/correct their data.
Longer term, Apple doesn’t have the same resources as Google, and it will continue to rely on acquisitions and 3rd parties. If Apple can get its house in order and build a successful geodata engine, it may find over time that sourcing 3rd party data also has its advantages. Google isn’t the best at everything and with social and indoor becoming important parts of the pie, there may be benefits.
Anyone who doesn’t believe the importance of maps as a tightly integrated part of the overall mobile phone experience just got confirmation.
After surveying the impacts of spectrum mortgage as proposed in India, we cast our eyes on Brazil for another policy matter: tax.
Essentially, the Communications Minister of Brazil is concerned with the following:
“Excessive” taxes that amount to “38% of mobile phone bills”
“Distortion” as a result of higher taxes on prepaid services (52% of phone bills) than postpaid (21%)
By reducing taxes, the government aims to promote spending, thereby stimulating the economy. Of course, it is well aware of the trade-off involved between macroeconomic goals – growth and fiscal balance in this case. However, the minister believes that tax receipts do not have to fall given the rising revenue earned by the telecom industry – 10% year-on-year higher in 2011, he estimates.There are other policy considerations, including the potential implications onthe goal of equity,digital divide andwelfare cost. Theseunexamined issues are explored in our recently published ABI Insight. We also looked at thefiscal prospect from another perspectivein the context of falling prepaid subscription ratio, as well asthe dynamic between a new tax regime and other measures to boost smartphone penetration.