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22 September 2002 |
WSJ reports that from Oct 2002 Vodafone wants handset manufacturers to install "Vodafone Live" software, so that handsets from different mfrs behave the same way for GPRS services like picture messaging, games, location services etc. At the same time, they want to own the brand on handsets from the smaller mfrs - ie: the ones that aren't Nokia.
Analysts say that this new development is a perfect example of how European operators are trying to persuade consumers to be loyal to them rather than to particular handset makers. Many Europeans still tend to choose a handset and then select the operator that is selling that model at the lowest price.
Gartner's research comment: "You cannot underestimate the purchasing power of Vodafone. They have tremendous leverage over handset makers.".
That Microsoft (Stinger), Vodafone and Nokia (with both Symbian and its Series 60 platform) are all fighting for ownership of key software layers, shows that it's not just a battle over branding the device or the software, but also a recognition that the user interface is increasingly a critical component of mobile phones. And a fear of gradually being turned into a low-margin commodity company by others who control key software.
[via Newsnow, and Bloomberg, Telecom.paper and Business and Finance]
Related:
8:11:56 PM 
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What are we without our closest, most personal technology? Rodcorp feels lost without watch and mobile, although in a pinch the mobile alone will do. In Europe mobile phone market is saturated - mobile ownership mainstreamed a year or two ago. Here, it feels as if someone without a mobile number has committed the network crime of deliberately not connecting themselves in, of wilfully with-holding a potential node from the social network. It's even worse than not having an e-mail address. And no-one wants to ring an office or home number - the mobile phone is the always-available communications gateway to Alice. As far as Bob, Carol and Alice's other contacts are concerned, their handsets contain a phone number which is her identity. So Alice=CLI.
But how does she think of herself? She feels nervous without the mobile to hand. Alice=Nokia. The mobile phone market is driven by a natural selection at the handset level - features, ringtones, swappable covers, etc, with new features not hitting the social radar until some sort of tipping point is reached (viz sms, wap, picture messaging/gprs, at which point it spreads like wildfire - although sadly not Wildfire). This happens partly because mobile phone operators still can't get simple pricing models in the hands of consumers, but mostly because the handset is more tangible - desirable - than the invisible pipe that connects it to the network. Alice=Nokia, but wants to =NewerNokia. (Could we even say that we are reasonably efficient transmission mechanism exploited by mobiles - this being the digital analogue of the idea that wheat exploits humans, probably from Jared Diamond? ... a kind of, forgive us, a symbi(an)osis?)
Our phones are part of how we think of ourselves, but our number/address is how others think of us. I, Nokia... You, 0770 900871.
Aside: actually it should have been titled I, Sony, but Rodcorp still misses the Nokia UI. And don't dial that phone number - it's not real. See Oftel's useful list of fake-but-plausible phone numbers.
Homework/related info:
8:11:02 PM
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Telesym's SymPhone lets you take and make calls for free over IP with your 802.11/PocketPC PDA if you're in range of the corporate wireless network. If not, use your mobile. Rodcorp thinks there's more mileage in putting soft telephony into dirt cheap devices.
6:18:03 PM
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© Copyright 2003 rodcorp.
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