iPhone nano

This is my wish for this holiday, a product that I would like to see.

Like an iPhone to an iPod Touch, the size of an iPhone nano should be similar to an iPod nano. It is small and its screen is only good for limited yet well defined functions, such as choosing an album, point-and-shoot camera and address book sync. It will not be a good game device nor a good email reader. It sounds like quite the opposite of all the trendy development nowadays: the bigger, the better. The latest phone is so big that you have to attend to your weight training and fitness program diligently in order to keep your arm strength up with the phone.

But an iPhone nano will be very good for one thing: tethering. It should have the same data connection capability as its cousin. It makes such a device a good companion for iPads and laptops. A user with such a device will not need a separate data contract or go through a complicated data sharing arrangement. When the data connection drains battery too fast, it borrows power from the big device it connects to. In my opinion, a cell phone with a near 5-inch screen serves no purpose well. A cell phone should be compact enough to be dropped in virtually any pocket. And the size of an iPad mini is the minimum to be adequate for a tablet. For people that need a cell phone with a long-lasting battery and a good-sized mobile device, this imaginary iPhone nano is probably a good alternative, if not the best.

Why now? The time is ripe to push further for tablets. The need for data connection is more a given than an after-thought. Wireless carriers may frown at the product as a double-edged sword. Can Android community do this? I have not seen a decent small Android phone yet. All those carrier-branded, dumb-down small Android phones look undesirable. Can Nokia do this? Nokia is very good at building solid yet cute phones. But Nokia may no longer have the influence to persuade carriers to promote such a product. Apple needs an inexpensive phone to combat Android in markets where carrier subsidy is not a preferred business practice. An iPhone nano may fill the bill and sells more iPad.

Apple Map

It started with a map application, CEO's apology for the bad user experience, and now the departure of a senior executive.

http://www.apple.com/letter-from-tim-cook-on-maps/
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/30/us-apple-changes-idUSBRE89S18H20121030

It is obvious that Apple would want to have a map application of its own. What a smart phone or tablet can provide that a laptop cannot easily match is its mobility and portability. Many applications on iOS give users the ability to make decisions or acquire needed information on the spot in real time. Map data, or say information for location and surroundings, need to be integrated into the platform, iOS, for more interesting applications to happen.

Up to now, Siri cannot have a real conversion with its user. The usage is still limited to question-and-answer in a request-response fashion. When Siri is able to have a conversion, the conversation will have a context. The context may be defined by the state of the conversation on top of other inputs, say, an email, a previous phone call or voice message, or recent locations. Google search and map application may not be able to provide all that Apple needs, not to mention the competition between the two companies. 

Recent news reported Apple's executive, the head of iOS, Scott Forstall was let go for the blame of Apple map. I think office dynamics goes beyond one product flop. Apple has produced 'sub-standard' hardware and software before. It is not the first time and it will not be the last time Apple makes a mistake. Google has been working on map applications for years. Even if there is no bug in Apple's map application, it would not be as feature rich as Google's map in this first release. Judging from Mr. Cook's letter, Apple is working on some advanced applications that require integration beyond today's interface. For an iOS developer like myself, it is good to see someone firmly at the helm of the company. It is even more important to see the company make steady progress and eventually grow beyond its legendary founder. 

Screen size of a smart phone

The Android phone industry just hands out one oversized Android phone after another.

Let's look at these big phones.

Samsung Galaxy Nexus 4G, 135 x 67.9mm with 1280x800 pixels (aspect ratio 8:5)
Samsung Galaxy SII 125.3 x 66.1mm with 800x480 pixels (aspect ratio 5:3)
HTC EVO 3D 126.1 x 65.4mm with 960x540 pixels (aspect ratio 16:9)
And Samsung Galaxy Note trumps all of them at 146.9 x 9.7 mm with 1280x800 pixels.
(For reference, iPhone 4S 115.2 x 58.6 mm with 960x640 pixels)

I don't understand why all the obsessions with a gigantic screen on a phone.  Without a big hand, one can hardly wrap his/her thumb around to touch the right spot on the screen with one hand.  A purse or bag is required to carried it around.  Putting it in a pocket is possible but it takes away too much precious real estate of a pocket. And a big screen burns battery much too fast.

Another problem is the aspect ratio of the screen.  It already presents a design challenge for me when designing a universal game for both iPhone (3:2) and iPad (4:3).  But I can make an excuse between a phone and a tablet.  Stretching images into a different aspect ratio does not make it picture perfect.  The other choice is to fill un-used space with background color or image. There are many blogs and articles discussing techniques dealing with this issue.  But none has talked about how to test and see the user interface on different screens without buying all of them.

Bigger screens will not make those products more appealing to consumers, when human factors are taken out of product design. I also wonder whether Samsung and HTC care to tend Android application and game developers.  The two leading Android brands behave like pure hardware manufacturers that don't seem to appreciate the importance of consistency to the ecosystem which adds value to Android phones. At the same time, I heard it is the carriers who drive product specifications.  Well, carriers have never had a love for third party developers.

No more mobile Flash

Adobe gave up on mobile Flash.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/09/us-adobe-apple-idUSTRE7A84NO20111109

Now it is even more obvious that HTML5 is the technology of choice.  HTML5 originated from the grudge of companies that wanted to break free from a dysfunctional consortium, W3C.  It is not every day that an open standard comes out winning.  Nokia/Symbian used to be the major licensee of mobile Flash.  But Symbian is no longer a viable platform. Windows Mobile is going with Silverlight.  Google has been a major champion for HTML5.  It is up to Adobe to work on various hardware compositions with Android licensees.   I don't know whether Adobe had planned for all the factors or whether Adobe has done its best to meet the challenges head on.  The consequence of the announcement is that Adobe has not just given up on mobile Flash, it also sent a disturbing signal to its developer community.

Developers invest in technologies that they can leverage upon.  When Adobe stopped the development of mobile Flash, it means all the technical know-how and the digital assets invested in Flash are not going to be applicable on mobile devices.  Mobile devices are the new frontier.  If developers have no Flash but HTML5 on mobile devices, the future investment of their money, time, and brain power will go to HTML5. The death of mobile Flash is not just the end of Flash on mobile devices.  It will soon drag down the desktop Flash with it.

Will HTC have its own OS

Rumor has it that HTC is contemplating on buying an OS for itself.
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/50859.php

"We have given it thought and we have discussed it internally, but we will not do it on impulse." HTC Chairwoman, Cher Wang said in an interview.  She went further on, "Our strength lies in understanding an OS, but it does not mean that we have to produce an OS."

It takes approximately 40 to 50 million dollars annually to maintain a team of 200 for mobile OS R&D.  It is quite affordable to today's HTC.  But what will be the strategic position for this OS? If the new OS is to replace Windows Mobile OS, an annual operating cost of $40 million can justify some $70 to $100 million royalty paid yearly for Windows Mobile licenses.  But Windows Mobile OS is not the one making HTC feel naked.  It is Google's Android, which does not have a royalty based license.

Maybe the whole thing is just some psychological response to Google's buying Motorola Mobile. Or maybe it is because HP's webOS is available at this inopportune time. HTC did not express this idea in such a way as "We'd like to build our own team and our own OS". HTC actually had an small Linux team before. Without a strategy in mind and a concise goal to develop OS in a culture dominated by hardware business, acquisition will not add value. The interesting part is that, though everyone in the mobile industry thinks OS makes a difference, not many companies got it right or even bother to approach it.  If Google is to build its own hardware business, what can HTC do? Without an alternative, what HTC should keep an eye on is companies like ZTE, not Google's Moto.

Steve Jobs resigned

Steve Jobs announced his resignation as CEO of Apple.
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2011/08/24Steve-Jobs-Resigns-as-CEO-of-Apple.html
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2011/08/24Letter-from-Steve-Jobs.html

Jobs turned Apple around from the brink of bankruptcy.  It was no small feast to say the least.  What he and Apple impressed me most was the way Apple jumped in and woke up a very competitive and already booming cell phone industry by introducing iPhone.  In 2007, more than 1.1 billion units of cell phones were shipped, while there were only 271 million units of PC shipped in 2007.  Among those, more than 110 million units were smart phones. The number one cell phone vendor in 2007, Nokia, owned at least 36% of the overall cell phone market and over 50% of the smart phone market.  Nokia had a record revenue in 2007 at €51 billion, which was approximately $80 billion dollars on an average exchange rate of 1 EUR to 1.5 dollar.  While the whole electronic-hardware industry looked at the cell phone industry as the main source of demand, Apple walked in with iPhone and told everyone the king has no clothes on.  Given an average lead time of two years for a brand new cell phone, the iPhone project might have started in early 2005.  In 2005, North America was only a barren field for smart phones.

Apple's stock fell only slightly to $373.72, a drop of $2.46 or 0.65% today.  It seems that the market believes Apple now stands firm on the ground, not on Jobs' shoulder.  No matter it is an impression or a reality, Apple will eventually out-grow Jobs.  Some people in the Valley refer Jobs as "micro-management". That is an expression of their own preferences.  After all, Jobs delivered products, revenue and profit to underscore his leadership style.  Not many CEOs on earth can say the same, no matter what their preference in leadership styles is.

HP/Palm webOS deserves a true steward

Now HP's executive is saying "We stand by webOS", after offically abandoning it.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-08-19/hewlett-packard-webos-software-bought-with-palm-not-dead-dewitt-says.html

I received the WebOS developer blog in my email with the title "The next chapter for webOS", signed by Richard Kerris VP webOS Developer Relations.  In it, it claims the development and innovation will continue, although the planned developer events around the world may have changes.  And one of HP's Senior Vice President Stephen DeWitt said in an interview, "The webOS is not dead... We’re going to continue to evolve it, update and support it. We stand by it."  If you look at the price of webOS tablet went down in the past weekend, those words carry neither weight nor meaning.

In my previous blog, I believed HP should go for products, not licensing business.  Even now there will be no webOS based product from HP, licensing it still makes no sense.  The licensing fee will not recoup the R&D cost, as shown by Microsoft Windows Mobile revenue.  A cost center will not result in a vibrant environment for innovation, which will kill webOS sooner than later.

HP should find a suitor for webOS and sell it, like Ebay eventually did for Skype. WebOS is modern and has a lot of value in it. It is not a burning platform like Symbian and Nokia Series-60. Find a worthy home for the team before they jump ship to Apple and Google and leave the webOS an empty shell.  After all, Palm's office is only 5 to 10 minutes drive away from Google and Apple's headquarters.

HP gave up on webOS

HP decided to stop producing tablets and smartphones based on webOS.
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/50543.php

It is really a sad yet harsh footnote to the cell phone industry.  I wonder what webOS folks would think if they look at the history of Google purchasing Android, Inc. and the rise of Android phones.  A little more than four years (August 2005 to April 2010) separated the fate of the two companies. Should I say the vision and execution of a company made such differences?  Excellent technologies can go only so far.

Now HP is going back to a Business-to-Business (B2B) company.  Look back not too far into HP's history. Carly Fiorina took HP past the point of no return to a PC OEM company.  The low-margin yet big-volume business impacted the company culture so much that the next CEO wanted a strategy for consumer products.  Or is it the big share of PC revenue demanded a consumer product oriented CEO?  So the next CEO, Mark Hurd, bought Palm and webOS. When Mr. Hurd left HP, the CEO followed, Léo Apotheker, decided otherwise.  People can say anything about his decision on discontinuing webOS.  But no one can say he made a wrong decision in buying Palm/webOS, because it was not his decision.  That fact makes him safe to call the shot in front of the board.

I registered as a webOS developer almost as soon as it is open to the public.  My attention to the platform however diminished as it has never gathered enough momentum.  I hope this blog will not become an obituary for webOS.  But hope against hope, who is to challenge Apple's supremacy of vertical integration?

Google Buys Motorola Mobility for its patent portfolio

Google is going to buy Motorola Mobility for $12.5 billion.
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/50468.php

The patent war in the cell phone industry has not ended but Motorola Mobility has benefited from it already. Google is an Internet service company, a software company, but not a manufacturer, not an expert in logistics.  This is purely a acquisition for Moto's patent portfolio. I do not see Google running Motorola Mobility and producing Google phones vigorously.

Some analysts thought Microsoft might be a winner in this deal, because of doubts and distrusts towards Google among the Android licensees.
http://www.totaltele.com/view.aspx?ID=467053
http://allthingsd.com/20110815/u-s-carriers-silent-on-motoroogle-but-france-telecom-gives-it-a-thumbs-up/
It is just a wishful thinking, in my opinion.  Microsoft was in the market licensing its Windows Mobile OS when Nokia had 60% of smartphone market share in 2006-2007.  The fact of dominant Nokia did not help Mircosoft to a strong second place.  Instead, RIM's Blackberry filled the gap and rose to the second place in 2008 and 2009. When Apple introduced iPhone in 2007 and made its stand in 2008, Android was still in its infancy.  Most vendors went to Google and invested their own resources to develop Android phones instead of diving deeper into Windows Mobile.  Why is that?  I have my thoughts on that, though without direct proof.  It suffices to say Windows Mobile is not attractive enough to OEM vendors given all the incentives and the business environment.

Maybe Google will spin off Motorola Mobility and share the patent portfolio with it once the acquisition is done. After all, it is all about patents and it is better for Google and Motorola Mobility to run separately.

HP webOS for OEM to license

HP is entertaining the idea of licensing its webOS to other vendors. Or is this just an indication that HP has not sorted out its strategy for webOS?

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/01/hp-ceo-idUSN0116927120110601

It can be a good news for the industry. One more contender means more choices. But this is just on the surface. Windows Mobile has shown that OS licensing is not a lucrative business in the mobile phone industry. If webOS can collect US$10 a piece, a volume at 3.5 million units a quarter, which is roughly Windows Mobile's 2011-Q1 shipment, makes US$140 million a year. It does not seem to be a reasonable payback for the US$1.2 billion paid for acquiring Palm. It may not even be enough for the operation cost for the business unit. Google Android makes money from advertisement revenue, not licensing fees. What is the leverage that HP can get by licensing webOS out? In the meantime, HP has to make it cost-effective for device vendors to invest in webOS. How many vendors have the extra budget and human resource to take on another OS, chipset, and board support package integration? HP did not talk or hint on intellectual property indemnification. With Microsoft onto everyone who is licensing Andorid, that is also an issue HP has to address when going to partners. http://www.zdnet.com/blog/hardware/microsofts-next-cash-cow-android/12998

The talk from HP's CEO seems to be a spillover of internal disagreement on future directions. It has been a year since HP acquired Palm. There can be some pressure built up over what webOS can do for HP. But it is clear to me, licensing webOS out will not help HP, only to create distractions.

Developers, Phones, and Applications

I recently read two articles that underlined my long-time viewpoint on applications, devices and developers.

http://www.cellular-news.com/story/48888.php
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9215832/Developers_not_phones_driving_mobile_banking_apps_

A lot of factors come in to the decision of whether to develop for a platform. It can be the accessibility to programming interface and talent poll, platform capability, application characteristics, cost and overhead, etc. Nevertheless, the dominant criterion is the volume of shipment. If a platform is sold like hot cakes, it is definitely worth taking a look. But the usefulness of this rule of thumb decreases dramatically from this point. The mystery lies within the percentage of addressable and target demographics among the user base of a particular platform.

As volume shows itself as an absolute number, yet it is a relative term. Look at this article from more than three years ago.
http://www.engadget.com/2008/02/11/whats-an-iphone-14-3m-windows-mobile-phones-sold-in-the-past-s/
I knew it had a wrong argument when I saw it three years ago. But I did not realize how wrong it was. In 2008, Windows Mobile shipped more than 16 million units of smartphones, roughly a quarter of what Nokia had shipped for the same category. Windows Mobile had more developers than iPhone OS or any other smartphone OS at that time. Microsoft was the number two smartphone OS provider and Windows Mobile was the number three smartphone platform. The number however did not carry it further. BlackBerry caught up from behind in 2008 and stood firm as number two smartphone platform (23M units in 2008 and 34M in 2009). It, too, lost momentum.

Many users of BlackBerry and Window Mobile phones are in for the access of corporate email. When the user population is so fixated on getting one thing, how can any application developer add any value to the platform? I had a colleague who said he could not get used to the touch screen of iPhone. He missed the qwerty keyboard of his old phone. When I asked what kind of applications he used on his phone most of the time. Unsurprisingly, it was the email. Being an application developer myself, I would not poll his opinion on user experience of a small device. Such a consumer is not among my target audience. This fact pretty much cut the majority of Microsoft's 16 million or BlackBerry's 23 million of 2008 out of the equation. After that, it hardly represented a volume of interest.

HP/Palm's WebOS would serve as a contrast. It has, in my opinion, an equally capable platform as any other OS, and a set of elegantly designed programming interface. But, alas, it has no volume.

Nokia picks Microsoft Windows Mobile

It finally happened. Symbian is gone and Nokia's mobile Linux platform, MeeGo, is in serious doubt.
Bloomberg
mocoNews.Net

Nokia gave up Symbian long time ago, right at the moment it bought Symbian and made it an open source. Nokia did not want to admit it in the hope of protecting its share price. Now, what would Qt of Trolltech do? Nokia bought Trolltech in 2008 with the intention of creating a uniform interface across S60, S40 and its then Linux platform, Maemo. Now S60, which sits on top of Symbian, bade its farewell; the visibility to Meego's future is unclear, and it does not add value to unify S40 with high end platforms. What does Qt plan to do with its API to Windows Mobile? Or not? Or will Nokia spat Qt out like EBay spat out Skype? Windows Mobile developers don't need Qt. They have been doing their trade for many years under Microsoft's leadership.

As Google VP of Engineering Vic Gundotra commented on Nokia's decision in his tweeter post, "Two turkeys do not make an eagle." He actually quoted this from Anssi Vanjoki, Nokia's ex EVP. Ironically, Vic Gundotra is an ex-Microsoft employee.

"Two turkeys make a bigger dish", I might add. Big mobile carriers do not want Nokia tread the Android path, afraid it will create an Apple/Google duopoly. But a join force between Microsoft and Nokia will not prevent it from happening. It is not because Windows Mobile is not good enough, but Nokia will not do it whole-heartily. Nokia did not kill MeeGo to show its resolution. It needs MeeGo for leverage. On the other hand, Nokia's new CEO, Stephen Elop, needs Windows Mobile to keep MeeGo from becoming complacent. Will this strategy work? Not for a big organization like Nokia. It just creates confusion, grudge and diversion. This reminds me of Gil Amelio, Apple's ex-CEO before Steve Jobs's come-back. Amelio cleaned the house so Jobs did not have to. Maybe that is what Elop will be in Nokia's history.

I am glad I have not spent time in developing applications for Symbian/Qt phones. It will take a lot for Nokia to restore trust among developers. Maybe Nokia will continue to be the king of low-end mobile phones, though the king knows he has very little on him. After all, the world still needs a lot of low-end phones for a long time to come.

My first iPhone application

I just released my first iPhone application on Apple App Store. The title is called "Tang Poems for the Youth" [幼學唐詩].

This application is for a very niche market, that is, people who have learned traditional Chinese. For me, this is a good opportunity examining the theory of long-tail market. As an independent iPhone application developer, I don't have a lot of resources or time. It is important to me that I don't have to resort to some esoteric programming tactics or interfaces to accomplish what I wanted to do. It is also equivalently important that I don't have to test through many different devices with different capabilities and screen real estate. In a sense, I created an application that appears to be outside of the main stream using mostly common programming interface on a generic platform, and made the product available on all the iPhone OS products For that, I praise iPhone and iPod Touch.

A friend asked me whether I will port this application to the Android platform. I am a registered Android developer though I have not put much of an effort in it. Android is an "open" platform for device manufacturers. It is no more open than Windows Mobile or iPhone OS for an application developer. It will take over iPhone in terms of volume, just like Symbian of yesterday. It will be a fragmented market for a developer like me. I will put more efforts in making my application iPad ready before having some quality time with Android.

In the meantime, there will be more titles coming out from me. I will see how far this long-tail theory will take me, and Apple.

Nokia has a new CEO

Nokia has a new CEO.

The title of the article is "Nokia’s New Chief Faces Culture of Complacency", by The New York Times.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/27/technology/27nokia.html?ref=technology

Does Nokia has a culture of complacency? See in the article how the spokeswoman responded to the comments from former employees, "They were, she said, “managers with individual roles or leaders of small teams.” ". Do you expect Nokia to have a vibrant work environment and its employees to feel empowered in what they do? Well, most of them are just "with individual roles or leaders of small teams".

This should be a textbook example for MBA classes.

Fancy Phone vs Smart Phone

The result of 1Q 2009 worldwide mobile phone sales just came out. The world map of smart phones has changed a lot since last year because of Apple's iPhone and RIM's BlackBerry.
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/37570.php

The mid to high end of cell phone market is traditionally defined by so called "smart phones" and "feature phones". A smart phone is (typically defined as) a cell phone being able to add applications to it. A feature phone is a cell phone with a bunch of applications pre-loaded, but an end user can not add software to it. When looking at the data and thinking of those manufacturers that used to have major shares in the smart phone market, I have to add one more category, "fancy phone" to the market mix.

What is a fancy phone? A fancy phone is a smart phone that a consumer buys one for its brand and look, or the prestige comes with the price, but not for its smart phone capabilities. The manufacturer would like to believe its smart phones are popular because of its features. A lot of market data were put together in the effort of proving the correlation between the market share and technological superiority. When true competition shows up, such a market share wanes rapidly, and people begin to realize the king does not have clothes on him.

Android Phone Delay

The rumor had it that the Android phone could face delays, http://www.cellular-news.com/story/31963.php.

But wait! Google immediately re-confirmed that the Android phone will be on schedule for release by the end of 2008. With T-Mobile US preparing for the launch of its first Android phone, everything seems to be on track. Then why was the rumor in the first place.

Not sure! It can be just a small marketing PR skirmish. It may be a good idea to remind people of Android amid the iPhone hype. I wrote two blogs on Android late last year and earlier this year. All indications pointed to the year end of 2008 as the earliest time frame for Android phones to join the market. In a way and in my opinion, Google has the easier part of creating an Android phone. Linux is part of Google's culture and it is not the first time for the Android team to put Java on top of an operating system. The manufacturers are taking the hard part in providing the Board Support Package (BSP) which links Android software to the underlying hardware. After all, cell phone hardware is far from being standardized as that in the PC industry.

Base on the track records of HTC and Samsung, it is a tight schedule for anything to show up for this Christmas. Nevertheless this rumor validated the marketing success of Android as press and consumers believed the "2nd half of 2008" to be July not December.

iPhone Hype and Market Research

You don't create a product like Wii or iPhone by just doing market research.

I was reading a market research report titled "iPhone Hype Holds Up". It compares the differences in usage between iPhone users and overall (including iPhone) smart phone users. It gives some interesting comparisons such as,

• 85% of iPhone owners access web content with the device versus 58% of the overall smart phone users.
• 31% of iPhone users watch mobile TV or video versus 14% of smart phone users.
  
• 49% of iPhone users access social networks and blogs using their phone versus 19% of smart phone users.
  

It is nothing new at all (see my earlier blog). The numbers in the survey provide a quantifiable justification to the common-sense observation at a hindsight. But I don't think Apple created iPhone because Apple has a way to read market research data differently. In late 2005 or early 2006 when Apple created the iPhone product program (my guess), the market research data must have shown a even bleaker view of what a smart phone user might be interested in doing with the device. I don't think it is the "only-the-paranoid-survive" factor, either. Many paranoids went belly up in the Valley while Apple is doing better than surviving.

Market research data tell you only what you ask for, sometimes not even that. I would guess the team created Nintando Wii asked questions like, "what prevents you from playing video games', instead of "what new feature will make you interested in video games more". There is another market research data, Smart Phone 2007 Result, from Canalys. This report may be useful for a financial analyst covering cell phone industry for a financial institute. But for people in the cell phone industry, they have to have the ambition of asking a bigger question. Except for that, the industry can just copy iPhone, and there is no shame in doing that. There are many great examples of copy cat littering all over in the high tech industry. But be aware, it is not easy to copy either.

3G Smartphone for Under US$100

NXP Semiconductors said it has a solution to 3G cell phone at a transfer price below US$100.
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/28971.php

For people not familiar with NXP, NXP is one of the top ten semiconductor manufacturers in recent years. It is to EU as Texas Instruments to the US. In the announcement, NXP said it is a solution for entry level 3G phones. But what makes 3G interesting, besides its bigger capacity to reduce operator's cost, is its data service. That implies a more sophisticated phone to run applications that utilize 3G data service. We may see a 3G smart phone with a retail price at $250 in a year or two.

It is nothing to be excited or surprised to see the price decreasing for a consumer product while it becomes more sophisticated. It is very natural during the evolution cycle of a mass-market consumer product. What can be exciting is that, in three to five years, we may see the majority of the cell phones in use running multimedia-rich Internet applications. That will open the door for all kinds of possibilities for the cell phone. Today smart phones are expensive and designed for business users. And the smart phone experience is a minimal transplant of the desktop experience. Creativity for cell phone applications will not blossom until the community realizes the Internet is in everyone's pocket.

The cost for hardware is the key to all that to happen. Once that starts, we can then discuss what the long tail effect is to be played out on such a ubiquitous and mobile network. In this view, NXP's announcement is an important milestone.

A Modular Cell Phone to Plug In

It is an interesting idea to have a minimal cell phone plugged into other electronic gadgets.

With the "basic" cell phone function taken out and made into a stand-alone module, it is possible to make any electronic device into a cell phone by "linking" the two. A cell phone enables its user to receive voice calls and have data connections. It is a "driver license" for a subscriber to use the network. Nowadays cell phone manufacturers want to make your cell phone to be your movie/MP3 player, camera, portal computer, and also your credit card. But a cell phone can not have the best user experience for everything at the same time. A bigger screen is always better for movie viewing and Internet browsing. A full-size keyboard or hand writing pad will make input easier. A better lens and CCD make a better camera. Those special purpose devices will always provide a better user experience.

I like this modular-cell-phone idea a lot, but not the idea of "plug-in", even if it uses a standard interface. It immediately eliminates combined use cases. One or two extra wireless connections will make the usability much better. Some people may have doubts about the need to bring more things than just "one phone". I don't think this will be a problem. Since it is as small as a credit card, it will mostly likely always be in your wallet, pocket, or purse. All you need to bring is your ear piece or the electronic gadget that you would bring with you anyway.

There are already blogs discussing similar ideas and even companies dedicated to this idea. You can search the web and see for yourself. My recommendation to those companies is to stick with near-term use cases and take the product off the ground. Those futuristic use cases will realize when time comes. And those futuristic use cases can disrupt and renew the industry profoundly.

Samsung Will Have a Google Android Phone in 2009

Samsung Electronics said it hopes to have a phone based on Google's Android platform by early 2009.

This was what I expected in my blog, Google Android Is Coming to Town: "Unless LG, Samsung and Motorola make some sizable commitments soon, Android will still be a very small player in the high-end market, even by 2010." And now, Samsung seems to feel more comfortable discussing its plan for the Android platform. I would imagine there is a hardware prototype floating around at Samsung, ready for review and software integration on top of it.

However, Samsung did not give any detail regarding the form factor, phone features, target consumer segment(s), price range, or geographical market focus. Samsung did not say whether it will be an Android for announcement or for sale by that 2009 time line, either. Usually, an announcement like this would have been accompanied by one of those details to entice the market or to distract competitors. Since it did not elaborate on any of these, I am guessing this prototype is really just a prototype to conceptually prove Android's capability.

I'd like to give Samsung more credit at this moment. Samsung was able to capitalize on Motorola's weakness the most during last year and that was a job well done. Like I said, if the market momentum shows for the Android platform in the near future, it is Samsung that has the logistics to ramp up volume, which is something the Android community should be contemplating.