News - Wireless

BuzzCity, a mobile networking and advertising start-up based in Singapore, on Thursday announced a $10 million investment by South African media company Naspers.

BuzzCity has developed a mobile social-networking product called MyGamma, but it's not hoping to take on Facebook. MyGamma is geared toward "unwired" customers--those who have a mobile device but lack access to either a PC or a reliable broadband connection. That's probably why it attracted the attention of Naspers--market research firm Point Topic estimated late in 2007 that there were fewer than 300,000 broadband Internet subscriptions in South Africa out of a population of 47 million. South Africa also happens to be one of the fastest-growing markets for BuzzCity's software.

"The growth opportunity for off-deck services continues to grow globally. We've seen phenomenal growth in markets in South Asia and Africa and in the coming year, we expect to see this growth to include markets in Europe and (the U.S.)," CEO K.F. Lai said in a release. "The past year for us has also been marked by partnerships with some of the world's leading WAP publishers and mobile digital agencies. BuzzCity has been on an aggressive development programme and secured overwhelming interest from businesses to be part of our growth plans."

BuzzCity is not alone in targeting this market. Medium-sized social network Hi5, with a strong foothold in the Latin American market, recently launched a mobile site designed with the same "unwired" consumers in mind.

Google on Thursday announced Android Market, an online center that will let people find, buy, download, and rate applications and other content for mobile phones equipped with the open-source operating system.

These screen shots show the Android phone interface to the Android Market. The software shows what applications can be downloaded and reviews of applications that people are browsing.

(Credit: Google)

Attracting developer attention is a key part of the Google-led Android software effort, and those who produce applications will have an easy time getting them to the market, Eric Chu of Google's Android project said in a Thursday blog post.

"Similar to YouTube, content can debut in the marketplace after only three simple steps: register as a merchant, upload and describe your content and publish it," Chu said. "We chose the term 'market' rather than 'store' because we feel that developers should have an open and unobstructed environment to make their content available."

Though the first Android phones are planned to arrive later this year, Chu said to expect the initial phone-based Android Market application to be a beta version that might only support distribution of free applications. An update later will handle different versions of applications, support for different profiles of Android phones, and analytics to help developers track adoption.

The move was expected. Google said in May at the Google I/O conference that it would provide a central repository of Android software.

In spite of the economic slowdown, worldwide mobile-phone sales rose nearly 12 percent in the second quarter of 2008 from the same period in 2007, market research firm Gartner said Thursday.

Growth was driven largely by the Asia-Pacific region, in which sales grew 20.5 percent from the second quarter of 2007, and the Middle East and Africa, where handset sales increased 18 percent.

In the United States and Canada, 6.5 percent year-over-year growth was driven largely by sales of replacement handsets, as new subscribers only trickled in, Gartner said. (Fellow research firm NPD Group, by contrast, reported earlier this month that U.S. mobile-phone sales were 13 percent down from the second quarter of 2007.)

Gartner's study did find a decrease in mobile-phone sales in Western Europe: down 8.2 percent down from the second quarter of 2007. And while the research firm forecasts 11 percent industrywide growth in 2008, it expects revenue growth to fall slightly behind that, as the economy and tougher competition take a toll on prices.

"The economic environment continued to negatively impact mobile-phone sales in both mature and emerging markets," Gartner analyst Carolina Milanesi said in a release. "Consumers in mature markets continued to favor midtier devices over high-end devices, while new subscribers continued to join mobile networks in emerging markets during the quarter. However, replacement sales remained weak, as consumers faced higher prices for fuel and food, in addition to higher levels of inflation."

The research firm has not changed its overall 2008 outlook of 1.28 billion handset sales.

Mobile search and advertising start-up JumpTap has received an additional $26 million in funding and has expanded its relationship with U.S. operator AT&T, the company said Tuesday.

JumpTap, based in Cambridge, Mass., provides search technology and advertising services for mobile operators such as AT&T and U.S. Cellular. The company also provides advertising for carriers and content owners such as NBC Universal and Fox Mobile.

JumpTap, which works with 17 mobile operators around the world, competes against search and advertising heavyweights such as Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft. The new funding, which completes the company's fourth round of financing, brings its total cash raised to around $72 million.

AllianceBernstein led this round of funding. It also included funding from previous investors, including General Catalyst Partners, Summerhill Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures, and Valhalla Partners.

The cash infusion will help the company continue to develop its technology and expand its sales force to take on the bigger players.

"It's really a David and Goliath story," said Paran Johar, chief marketing officer for the company. "And we aren't Goliath. It takes a lot of investment to compete against Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft."

But Johar believes that JumpTap is well-positioned to take on these big companies because it's not perceived as a threat by the mobile operators. The company has made significant inroads with operators around the world. It provides the technology and the operators are able to use the technology and integrate it as a "white label" solution into their own mobile platforms.

This approach differs from Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft, which all brand their mobile search platforms as their own.

It's still early days in the mobile search and advertising market. In fact, in 2007 the mobile advertising market was only worth $2.7 billion, according to eMarketer. That number is expected to jump to $4.8 billion in 2008 and could grow to more than $19 billion by 2012.

At this early stage in the game, operators are still trying to figure out which technology partners to work with. Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that Verizon Wireless is in talks with Google. Exactly what the scope of the agreement will be is still uncertain. But it's believed that Verizon will likely embed Google's search tools in some of its phones. And it will likely strike some kind of advertising/revenue sharing agreement with the search giant.

But Johar believes that operators should be wary about working closely with Google. Mobile operators have a wealth of information about their subscribers that can be used to refine search queries and tailor advertising to individuals, making the search and advertising content more relevant to users. This is great for search companies and terrific for operators who will likely get a cut of the advertising revenue. But giving up that information to a Google, for example, could end up being an operator's biggest mistake.

"No matter how big a check someone like Google can write, they are a Trojan horse," Johar said. "If an operator shares all its customer information, it will allow someone like Google to come in and commoditize the most precious assets it has, which is all that customer data."

Johar argues that JumpTap's white label approach allows operators to retain control of their customer information while still being able to use advanced search and advertising technology to tap into targeted advertising.

AT&T, Verizon Wireless' largest rival in the mobile market, is already working with JumpTap. AT&T is also working with Yahoo, which sells a portion of the carrier's ad inventory. But now JumpTap is deepening its relationship with AT&T, Johar says. Previously, JumpTap only powered the carrier's on-deck search, but now it will be accessing AT&T customer information to help sell targeted advertising.

"Google may have a larger share of the overall search market," he said. "But the game is just beginning in mobile, and we're just starting to unlock the data to provide better and more targeted search and advertising. So I feel very good about our position in the market."

A patent holding company that has won settlements from Apple, AT&T, and others sued Google, Verizon, and a handful of other companies on Tuesday for allegedly infringing on patents related to voice mail, according to a report from Reuters.

In addition to Google and Verizon, other defendants in the lawsuit filed by Klausner Technologies are: Cox Communications, LG Electronics, Comverse Technology, Embarq, PhoneFusion, RingCentral, and Grand Central, which was acquired by Google last year.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Tyler, Texas, alleges the companies are infringing his patents related to visual voice mail.

Representatives from Google, Cox, and PhoneFusion said they had not seen the lawsuit and declined to comment. An Embarq spokesman provided this e-mailed statement: "Embarq has not been served with any such lawsuit, but is confident that any claims that it has infringed on someone else's patent would be unfounded."

A Verizon spokeswoman provided this statement via e-mail: "We anticipated Klausner's action. We filed a declaratory judgment action in New York federal court on August 13. We are seeking a declaration that Klausner's visual voice mail patent is invalid and that Verizon's system does not infringe the patent in any event."

The other defendants were either working on getting comment or did not immediately return calls and e-mails seeking comment.

Klausner Technologies, a private company that holds several voice over IP patents, settled a lawsuit in June with Apple, which offers visual voice mail in its iPhone.

Klausner also settled with AT&T, eBay, which owns Skype, and Comcast, which agreed to a licensing deal as part of its settlement. The company remains in talks with Cablevision Systems, while Sprint Nextel signed a licensing deal and was not sued, Reuters reported.

Previously, Klausner sued and settled with AOL in 2006, and with Vonage last year. Terms of the settlements were not disclosed.

Klausner's lawsuit in December alleged that the defendants infringed on technology that visually alerts people when they get a new voice message and lets them selectively retrieve the messages.

Updated 1 p.m. PDT with Embarq comment, and 12:37 p.m. PDT with Verizon comment.

One of the patents at the core of Klausner's lawsuits over voice mail, which was attached as evidence in Verizon's filing for declaratory judgment.

(Credit: Klausner Technologies)

The blog "Android Guys" has published an engineering drawing of T-Mobile's soon to be released Android phone codenamed the T-Mobile G1.

The images show more information about the device than any of the other mock-ups that have zipped around the blogosphere.

One of the more interesting tidbits from the drawing is a slight tilt of the bottom part of the phone where the trackball is located. The device has a full QWERTY keyboard with nicely spaced buttons. The Android Guys note this is reminiscent of recent Sidekick designs, and the site gives it a thumbs-up.

The blog "Android Community" has used the drawing to calculate the phone's dimensions and reports that the thickness of the G1, also known as the HTC Dream, is approximately 0.64-inches or 16.35mm. Apple's iPhone, which doesn't have a flip-out screen, is 12.3 mm thick. It also looks like the G1's screen size is comparable to the iPhone's 3.5-inch screen.

There is also a "menu" button on the G1, according to the drawing, which will likely be used to launch Google services.

The HTC phone, which is expected to be widely available on T-Mobile's network in October, is the first phone that will use Google's Android operating system. Rumors about the phone have been flying through cyberspace for months in anticipation of its launch.

The device is expected to be priced at about $399 full retail or about $150 with a two-year contract from T-Mobile. One blog reports that the device will go on sale October 13, 2008, with pre-orders for existing T-Mobile customers to begin September 17.

Some of the rumored specs for the device include: a full QWERTY keyboard; 3G/Wi-Fi; full HTML browser; easy access to Google apps, maps (with Street View); YouTube; IM and text; e-mail; 3-megapixel camera; video playback; a music player plus a memory card slot; and an application store.

AT&T announced Tuesday it's expanding its iPhone international data plans, in a move designed to cut consumers' reliance on pay-per-use data services.

Under the expansion, which is slated to begin Wednesday, iPhone users can add one of two international plans to their existing service.

The 100MB iPhone plan will cost an additional monthly fee of $119.99, while the 200MB plan will run an additional $199.99 a month. Both plans can be added or dropped from users' existing plans at any time, without penalty.

On a pay-per-use data basis, users could pay as much as 0.0195 cents per kilobyte, which translates into nearly $40 for 2MB of data, according to AT&T.

"AT&T has worked diligently to provide affordable options for international roaming because the feature-rich mobile experience of iPhone is indispensable to users," Bill Hague, AT&T wireless operations international executive vice president, said in a statement. "With these new international data plans, iPhone users can access more data in more countries for less cost."

Although AT&T's two expanded data plans offer the discounted data roaming package in 67 countries, such as China, India, Israel, and the United Kingdom, the rate outside of these areas is higher.

A 1 cent per KB rate is charged for areas outside the 67 countries, but a higher rate of nearly 2 cents, or 0.0195, per KB applies in 20 countries such as Bolivia, Mongolia, Saudi Arabia,Turkey, and Venezuela.

AT&T also advises iPhone users to save data costs by taking several steps, such as using Wi-Fi whenever possible, turning off automatic e-mail checks, and keeping data roaming in the preset off position.

Google is lending its hand to help revive public access to a citywide Wi-Fi network abandoned by EarthLink.

Last week, The Milpitas Post Web site reported that a nonprofit group, made up of Google, I-Net Solutions, and some wireless equipment makers, is working with the city to operate the network to provide free wireless service to residents.

Under a new agreement, which has yet to be finalized, Milpitas will contract with the nonprofit to provide technical support and to run the service, which will provide Wi-Fi Internet access to the city government as well as free access to residents.

The free public access Wi-Fi network would operate in a similar way to the one offered by Google in Mountain View, Calif.

Google, in particular, has been a big proponent of citywide Wi-Fi networks. In a recent policy blog, Derek Slater, a policy analyst for Google, said that municipal Wi-Fi has gotten a bum rap from the press.

"Rather than prematurely writing off the idea, it's important to critically study municipal networks' successes and shortcomings," he said in the blog. "As we've written about before, America generally lags behind the rest of the developed world in broadband penetration and speeds, and we ought to be exploring many different solutions, both private and public, to bring fast, affordable Internet access to everyone."

Google is not only supporting the idea of free citywide Wi-Fi networks, but it's also pushing the Federal Communications Commission to open up new "white space" spectrum between broadcast TV channels that can also be used to provide free or inexpensive broadband access.

The Milpitas network was originally built by EarthLink, which spent $1 million on the infrastructure equipment. It charged a monthly fee to residents to access the service. But earlier this year, EarthLink abandoned the network when it exited the citywide Wi-Fi business. It handed the network assets over to the city, which has used it for police and fire public safety.

Milpitas is not the first of EarthLink's old networks to get help from new investors. EarthLink's wireless network in Philadelphia was supposed to be dismantled in June, but at the eleventh hour a group of local investors, called Network Acquisition Company, stepped in to save the network. It currently offers free Wi-Fi access in parts of the city.

Google is close to inking a deal with Verizon that would build its search interface into the mobile phone service provider's products, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.

The deal, still not final, would make Google's search service central to a one-stop search mechanism for Verizon devices, and Google will share revenue from the service, the newspaper reported, citing unnamed people familiar with the matter. Still under negotiation are issues such as whether Google would be allowed to save information from users' searches, the paper said.

Revenue-sharing terms had held up the partnership, which Google has sought for a year, the Journal reported.

Mobile phones, increasingly powerful and ubiquitous, are a major battleground for technology companies seeking to consolidate a fragmented market. Google rival Yahoo already has mobile phone software deals with several mobile operators.

(Credit: Yahoo Inc.)

Updated on 8/21/08 at 3:54 pm to correct information about the models supported.

Starting Thursday, searching the Web with a Nokia series 60 phone will be a little faster.

Yahoo's mobile team has released a free shortcut for OneSearch, Yahoo's search engine, that will live on your phone's home screen. The OneSearch widget promises to cut your labor two ways; first, by giving you a place to begin a Web search as soon as you turn on the phone and second, by suggesting search terms as soon as you start typing.

The home screen search widget has already been in effect on other mobile platforms, but this add-on software gives it greater prominence than it might otherwise receive.

The convenience of the home screen search bar could also make this OneSearch widget the most effective of Yahoo's latest experiments in pushing its search platform, including last April's launch of OneSearch 2.0, a version that accepts voice search.

Yahoo has its stalwart supporters, but this application's degree of success will depend on just how many Google search-loyalists end up suspending that preference in order to save time with Yahoo's search bar.

Yahoo's OneSearch shortcut will work immediately on all Nokia series 60 phones, including N70, N95, N73, and E65 models, with support for other platforms reportedly coming soon.