Business17.02.2010

Top Five Hot Topics at Mobile World Congress 2010

Mobile content is top of the agenda at this year’s industry jamboree in Barcelona and most industry announcements give something away about the content strategies of the organisations involved.  A report detailing the findings is available to download for free from the Juniper website from today.

1.      Flurry of launches to increase competition in the Smartphone space

Smartphone launches from Samsung, Sony Ericsson, ZTE, Motorola Acer and several others will dramatically increase competition in the Smartphone space. Samsung’s Wave will be available in May and includes access to Samsung’s App store.

2. Operators announce Apps Community

In the Apps market, the launch by 24 mobile operators of a ‘Wholesale Applications Community’ should allow for mobile internet and applications to be downloaded without the potential headache of conflicting technologies. Operators that have signed up include AT&T, China Mobile, Deutsche Telekom, Telefonica, Sprint and Verizon Wireless.

3. GSMA embarks on LTE interconnection standards

With LTE now boasting several live roll-outs and as many as 75 build-out commitments, some 40 mobile industry organisations have now backed industry association GSMA’s initiative to standardise the delivery of voice and messaging services for LTE. The advent of LTE may also open the door for operators to tier their levels of service for content carriage and charge accordingly.

4. NFC payment trial at Mobile World Congress to presage widespread NFC adoption?

A SIM based mobile payments trial by the GSMA, Samsung, Telefonica, and several partners could herald a new era in the development of mobile payments using NFC (Near Field Communications) technology.

While this trial will raise awareness of the technology, it will be the commercial launch of NFC handsets that drive NFC’s adoption- as well as reconciling the interests of the various stakeholders in NFC- from mobile operator, such as 02 in this case, to payment facilitator (Visa, La Caixa).

5. Android platform gains critical mass- the rise of the open source OS

MWC 2010 has seen a proliferation of mobile handsets using Google’s Android platform with announcements from Alcatel, Dell, HTC, LG, Motorola, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and ZTE.

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