Information Unleashed: The Coming of Wireless Data (1999)

Information is about to be freed from its dependence on wires * But no single company has all the assets it will need to dominate this emerging market * And to win long-term advantages, the sophisticated use of customer information will be essential Wireless information delivery has been around for a long time - indeed, since the first words spoken by human beings. More recently, Wireless information has been transmitted through military walkie-talkies and two-way police radios. And now, with the development of wireless devices that can log on to the Internet and send and receive data, wireless communication is joining, the digital age. Soon you will be able to use wireless services to easily check up on your stock portfolio, log on to your company intranet, check the weather in cities you visit, and read about restaurants where you might wish to eat. These developments are the result of improved mobile networks, the emergence of open Internet-based standards, and better technology for handheld devices. The upshot is that the market for wireless information is finally taking off. Sources of content are proliferating at an explosive rate [ILLUSTRATION FOR EXHIBIT 1 OMITTED], along with Internet and e-mail usage. Meanwhile, the number of professional people who spend time outside their offices is increasing [ILLUSTRATION FOR EXHIBIT 2 OMITTED], and they need portable devices to stay in touch [ILLUSTRATION FOR EXHIBIT 3 OMITTED]. By 2003, there could be 60 million users of wireless-data services in North America, and the market could be worth up to $10 billion. Of course, companies are scrambling to take advantage of this opportunity. Cisco and Motorola, for instance, have announced plans to develop and build wireless networks based on the Internet Protocol(*) (IP). Qualcomm and Ericsson have agreed jointly to support and license a single world standard for the next generation of wireless communications, and this will surely speed the development of wireless-data capabilities. Behind the deals and alliances is a growing awareness that no single player has all of the assets needed to dominate this emerging market. Such natural competitors as content providers, software companies, wireless-service providers, and equipment and device manufacturers will have to work together. Two factors will be decisive: gaining market share quickly by creating a complete wireless-data service and encouraging loyalty among customers by using information about them in a savvy way. How wireless data finally became a reality Three barriers prevented the earlier and wider adoption of wireless-data services. Wireless networks were originally built to carry voice traffic; as a result, their ability to carry data was limited. This problem was addressed at first through the use of overlays of digital protocols on existing analog cellular networks.(**) The new generation of wireless networks is being built on more data-friendly digital platforms, such as Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) and the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM). They make it easier to add packet-data protocols and to provide higher speeds. The second barrier was the absence of standards. Without them, developing and rolling out wireless-data applications has been both difficult and costly. Now, however, the creation of wireless support for Internet protocols is solving the problem. Although IP-based platforms and flexible interfaces were designed for wireline environments, they have been adapted to the needs of wireless. Currently, a number of applications are successfully taking shape. Meanwhile, additional enablers for wireless have been developed, such as the Wireless Markup Language (WML), a version of the HyperText Markup Language (HTML), which is used to design pages for the World Wide Web. WML makes it possible to adapt Web-based content for display across a range of devices with limited memory and small screens. …