Google has been stirring up a storm on the other side of the atlantic, Due to the TV stations going digital it has freed up the 700mhz band for mobile phone operators to use (does this mean we will need phones capable of handling 5 bands?). There will be bidding and google has said it will pay $4.6 billion IF its conditions are met.
The conditions are basically that (taken from itwire.com.au):
1) Licensees (being the mobile phone operators) must not limit or block end users from downloading any legal software applications, such as Skype;
2) Licensees must not lock individual handsets to specific wireless networks; (think iPhone and AT&T)
3) Licensees should be required to sell wholesale service to resellers on non-discriminatory commercial tems and conditions;
4) Licensees must open their wireless networks to enable third parties such as ISPs to interconnect.
I personally would welcome this – it is getting harder and harder to buy a mobile phone that is unlocked. Being one who travels a bit for work and pleasure I like to be able to buy a sim card in my destination country and put it in my phone and then not pay unbelievably high rates to make and recieve calls, (yes unlike our North American consumers, most of the rest of the world does not usually pay for incoming calls – I would complain if I lived there!!).
In recent months Google’s spending and development has been leaning towards the mobile telephony industry with them investing somewhere in the region of $25 million in a UK based company called Ubiquisys, that is developing a product to boost mobile phone signal so you can get better signal and then data transfer rates in the house or at your business.
Google have also been developing lots of mobile applications – like Google maps for mobile gmail for mobile, -I love this application and have found it to be very useful on a number of occasions. I have had to check my gmail account to confirm flight details of friends arriving, having forgotten to look before leaving the house and then found myself at the airport not sure where they were coming from, and which terminal they would be landing at!
The next few months will be interesting – because if Google get the way – it could pave the way for a lot more competition in the mobile phone industry. Basically it could boil down to the consumer just choosing the provider who gives them the cheaper data plan – and then downloading a VOIP application (like Skype) to do their calling – saving a lot of money in the process (Unfortunately for iPhone owners – their phones will not be that capable due to lack of 3G support – honestly Apple, what were you thinking, no 3G in this day and age….). The obvious outcome for Google would be more people browsing the web and hence more advertising revenue for Google!
Interesting. I think the openmoko project (openmoko.com) is on it’s advanced stage and will help make this very possible. This is another step into making the mobile world more open-source.