Enterprises as well as consumers should take note of the announced merger of Sprint and SoftBank. The $20b infusion of cash, along with a string of Sprint press releases, show a reawakened and more assertive wireless company. The US mobility news for some years now, has been centered mostly around Verizon and AT&T. Of course RIM also has been in the headlines lately, but that’s pretty much about their slowly fading fortunes.

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Tech reviewers have written much about the Surface, and we are again wondering if it will be more viable and popular than the iPad. I see this is a fundamental miss based on simple use cases. The iPad is and always will not be a laptop; it’s an appliance. This is a whole different animal and people seem to overlook that the iPad has created it’s own place in computing. It’s about the interface and what is most natural. Look at anyone using an iPad and you’ll see that their fingers moving on the screen. These are for the most part not keystrokes, rather they are navigating to get information versus inputting it.

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There have been quite a few articles surrounding the issue of throttling and now Verizon is being added to the conversation. I still believe the issue will come down to capacity rather than data. Here’s a quote from a piece in the WSJ from AT&T Chief Executive Randall Stephenson:

“In a capacity-constrained environment, usage-based data plans, increased pricing, managing the speeds of the highest volume users—these are all logical and necessary steps to manage utilization,” Mr. Stephenson said in a January conference call with analysts.   ANTON TROIANOVSKI And GREG BENSINGER, Wall Street Journal.

There’s going to have to be an option that serves those with real-time needs and those who get their data later.

Bob

The recent news about AT&T users experiencing throttling could be the beginning of where things are headed for mobile data costs. BGR ran a follow up article, AT&T on data throttling: Blame yourselves soon after which characterizes AT&T’s stance and provides an insight as to just how bad things are. In essence, the carriers, or in this case AT&T, don’t really have an answer for what will happen when there’s more data demand than supply. And make no mistake about it, we will get there sooner than you might think.

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As more states, counties, and municipalities ban or limit cell phone use while driving, beware the effect on equipment costs.  When California enacted legislation in 2008 the number of bluetooth headsets increased substantially.  This can be a challenge in an enterprise, where users may tolerate a wiped down phone, but usually will not re-use a headset that has been deep in someone else’s ear canal.  There are multiple options for managing those costs.  If you buy through your cell phone provider, it will show up as equipment cost.