On The Horizon – The Coming Ubiquity of Cool Things Wi

One of the many things I love about this new role is that I am paid for the luxury of doing some “ environmental scanning” - i.e. I get to look at market trends, analyst reports and stuff about what's new and cool (and not even here yet). Having come from mobile, I am still more drawn to that part of the world, but the overlap with the rest of the technology world is increasing exponentially.

Take WiFi/WiMax and the ability to use your cell phone (the smarter ones in particular) as a replacement for your laptop – hey don't laugh, it will happen. Trust me. Even today I can read and manipulate documents and presentations on my phone. I can even bluetooth my presentation to a projector and show it to a room full of people anywhere in the world – talk about portability. Last year when I talked about this, one of my colleagues claimed he would never give up his laptop; he uses it to take notes and can't imagine trying to type notes on the phone. Point taken, but what is interesting and imaginable is the prospect of some smart engineer developing a phone/app with the ability to transcribe voice into a document automagically (or perhaps someone is doing this right now). As I said, laptop replacement – it's only a matter of time.

I have a monthly data package from my cell carrier, so I am able to read email, surf the web, etc., but it can be slow. WiFi/WiMax could have a huge impact on this space – no wonder carriers offer all-you-can-eat data – it helps make up for the compression of voice ARPU, but also gives them a shot at holding on to subscribers if the industry shifts. Think about it – ubiquitous WiFi/WiMax with the addition of VOIP offers the ability to bypass carriers anywhere on the planet where you can get a wireless signal. The bulk of today's dual enabled phones use WiFi for data and cell for voice, but dual phones with seamless switching can't be far behind (these are already available today, but I think only within company walls). The ability to shift between cell and WiFi means I have more opportunity to access data at high speed in more places.

Both Samsung and Nokia have announced WiMax phones on the way; Nokia has just released a dual mode phone with VOIP – shown here on the left (inserted cleverly with the *Office blogging tool - well not so cleverly, my object wrap disappeared when imported).

Jajah has a cool app which is the mobile equivalent of Skype – I am waiting to hear back from them about a download for my particular phone – but basically you can call from your phone at very cheap to free rates. The app runs on many Symbian phones and additionally some non-Symbian Java phones (like the RAZR).

This will be an interesting space to watch and potentially a way to cut calling costs, both for personal and business calls.  Always love a good deal...