|
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Your advert here!!! Technical Editors:
Last modified: | Mobile Insight Vol: 8 Issue 298 January 2nd 2006Galileo on target for 2010A GPS busting technology – the European Galileo system – is looking good for
an operational deadline of 2010. Despite its strictly civilian origins, this
system must have the US military seriously scared. It's not the fact that the
first of 30 satellites - Giove-A - was put into orbit by a Russian Soyuz rocket
fired from Kazakhstan on Wednesday (28th December). Or the fact that the
European Union will be sharing some of the technological benefits with China.
Nope. It's the fact that Galileo will have the potential to be accurate to
within one metre (after an initial three metre accuracy). That compares with
standard GPS which is accurate to within about 30 metres for civilian
applications. The crucial point is that engineers in the control room of British
company, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), in Guildford, Surrey have
already received signals from Giove-A. This should mean that the satellite will
secure the necessary spectrum allocated to Galileo before the July 2006
deadline. If that hadn't have happened then the European Space Agency could have
lost permission to use those frequencies from the ITU (International
Telecommunications Union). Most of Galileo's potential applications have
something to do with navigation. However, the potential for location-based
services for mobile phones shouldn't be underestimated. For example, most 3G
handsets sold by 3 in the UK now have a built-n A-GPS function. With Galileo
chips inside mobile phones, location services will work even better. Plus,
unlike standard GPS, Galileo is deliberately designed to work inside buildings
and built-up areas. Giove A is an acronym of Galileo In-Orbit Validation Element
A, but Giove apparently also means Jupiter in Italian.
Handsets
help Sony Connect
According to figures produced by market watcher, Hitwise, Sony's Connect site is
beginning to catch up with arch rival Apple's iTunes music store. It's now in
second place whereas this time last year that position was held by Napster and
it was 15th. The reason for Connect's mercurial rise may be connected to sales
of the Sony Ericsson Walkman handsets, says Heather Hopkins, director of
research at Hitwise UK. She argues that the mobile phone is tightly integrated
with the Connect site. The UK mobile phone industry certainly supports the view
that Walkman handsets are in great demand whereas sales of the rival Motorola
Rckr – which links to Apple's iTunes software – are proving disappointing. There
are even reports of the Rckr being discounted. Still the iTunes store is way
ahead – receiving twice as many hits as Sony Connect. Its traffic over the Xmas
period was also half as much again as in 2004. The British Phonographic Industry
(BPI) has said that UK download sales have so far topped 23 million which is an
enormous increase over the 4.7 million digital music download sales it recorded
last year. NTL/Telewest merger approvedThe UK regulator, OFT (Office of Fair Trading), has cleared both the merger of Britain's two largest cable operators – Telwest and NTL, as well as BSkyB's acquisition of DSL provider, Easynet. NTL and Telewest are both listed on Nasdaq with about 5 million customers in UK and the new entity will become the second largest domestic telephone supplier behind BT. In approving the £211 million acquisition of Easynet by BSkyB, the OFT concluded that BSkyB had not abused its position with regard to supplying content to DSL providers. Indeed it has signed deals with Kingston Communications and Homechoice. Rivals had argued that NTL and Telewest should open their networks up to others as a result of the merger. But the OFT said that as the two networks didn't have competing networks in the same geographical areas, there wasn't any impact on competition. Plus – since the Competition Commission found no objections to the merger between NTL and Cable and Wireless back in 2000 - it didn't see how there could be objections to the new cable company merger.What this really leaves up in the air is NTL's previous interest in merging with Virgin Mobile – a move which is currently stalled. Could BSkyB be amazingly cheeky and bid for Virgin Mobile itself, Mobile Insight wonders? Psion's Potter calls for middlemenThe head of Psion, Sir David Potter, claims Britain needs nation institutes to drive forward technological innovation and act as 'middlemen'. This is his theory as to why the UK lost the lead in handheld computers.
Potter was seeking to explain to the FT how the UK could have done so badly when Psion introduced the first handheld – the Organiser – in 1986 while Sir Alan Sugar's Amstrad introduced the first commercial PDA back in 1991.
Describing why he originally chose to move out of games into handhelds, Potter suggested, "I would have probably [needed] pink hair and a pony tail." Instead Psion introduced one of Mobile Insight's favourite PDAs – the Revo.
So why did Psion suddenly pull out of consumer handhelds back in 2001? Why didn't it merely do a MG Rover and sell out lock, stock and barrel to a Chinese manufacturer?
Mobile Insight would argue that what Psion needed to have done was to listen to marketing. Why didn't the Revo have an industry standard memory slot when Psion Dacom employees were experts in PCMCIA? Why didn't it launch a Symbian version of its Netbook Pro when 2,900 people signed a petition for it?
Nonetheless, despite the fact that Potter has sold off the family silver – its Symbian stake and Psion Software, for example – he still appears proud of the rump that is Psion. Including high-end PDA manufacturer, Psion Teklogix, of course. Crazy Frog guilty of deceitThe company which resells the popular Crazy Frog ringtone in the UK, mBlox, has just been fined £40,000 by the industry regulator, ICSTIS. It has also forced mBlox to provide refunds to at least 338 people who had complained about the Crazy Frog adverts as being misleading. These encouraged TV viewers to sign up to a ringtone club - rather than just being a one-off payment for a single ringtone. Consequently many consumers found themselves paying for additional ringtones - at £1.50 a time - which they didn't even realise they had ordered. Thus consumers were being duped into paying for something they didn't really want. Industry watchers - including analysts, Juniper Research - have called for an end to the policy of offering subscription services as this practice has tarnished the image of the entire mobile content industry. The problem is that the industry is currently self-regulating and ICSTIS has no powers to regulate Jamba which actually owns the Crazy Frog brand. Since Jamba doesn't sell direct, it falls outside ICSTIS's current remit. Considering how difficult it is to find ICSTIS, 338 is an amasing high number of complaints.SnippetsIn Site of the Week (by Tony Dennis)This week
McFly |
|
