Watching The Wireless Market

Wireless technology represents a vast potential market for Solution Providers but one that's still being explored. DlLoitte, Touche Consulting looked at the wireless phenomenon in its Technology Trends annual report and shares its insights with articles from that report here online at Solution Provider University.

This is Carol Ellison, senior editor at VARBusiness and today on Solution Provider radio, we're joined by Philip L. Asmundson, Deputy National Practice Director of the Technology & Communications practice at Deloitte, Touche, who is here to share observations from the wireless frontier.

Phil, thank you for joining us.

VARBusiness: One of the topics you cover in Tech Trends is "fixed wireless." What exactly is "fixed wireless" and what opportunities does it portend for solution providers and their clients.

Amundson: Fixed wireless can be a very very powerful use of communications spectrum and really is deployed in high density areas. It's not really used in the typical sense that we think of wireless -- and that is in a mobile environment -- but instead it's used to link building to building to building to fiber backbone which, in effect, creates another last-mile solution.

VB: You also discuss wireless applications in mini-networks for small businesses and the home. What are some of the practical applications in those settings and what technologies show the most promise?

Asmundson: Well, on the business side it's almost endless. The home is somewhat more limited. The home will be more used for networking, allowing machine-to-machine to communication. The idea might be, for instance, your mobile device -- I tend to call it a lifestyle device; we tend today to call it a mobile phone -- will be doing many, many applications for us and that's why it becomes something that will be used to create our own personal area network or to create our lifestyle device. For instance, that device can literally replace your wallet. Virtually everything in ther from credit cards to ATM cards to frequent flyer mileage cards to access cards to billing can all go away and be implanted in this lifestyle device. Now, the first thing people say to me when we talk about this is "but if you lose this device what happens?' And I always point out that you could lose your wallet but the fact of the matter is that there's added security. So the way it will work in the home is that when you walk into your house, these devices will end up talking to each other so that they'll instantly sense that one is there to the other and this concept of hot-sync will be done literally automatically between your home network which today we call our home computer and this lifestyle device.

In the business environment, as I said, it's virtually endless. These devices become a way to actually conduct commerce and this whole concept of M-commerce that so many wireless carriers are excited about because it adds transaction fees to the way their revenue streams work, really could start to revolutionize the way business is done. It, literally, can start to allow for specific marketing and by that I mean a small business can actually start to pinpoint customers who may be located nearby. They may be walking by a store and they can start to talk again with the device these people have and there may be a shopping list in there. And it may be that on my shopping list I need to get a pair of men's shoes. Well, if I happen to be in downtown Dallas and I happen to be walking by Nordstrom's, Nordstrom's can signal me that they'll give me 25 percent off if I come in right now and purchase shoes. It also becomes a very strong vehicle for conducting transactions. I can get rid of virtually all of my other customer facing equipment and just have one centralized device in things like malls that can start to transact with these devices wirelessly. So when I come up to the counter at the store, at the Gap let's say, and I buy a pair of pants or something, I don't even give them a credit care anymore. Instead I just dial up or scroll down within my wireless device, pick the device I want to use and hit send. It looks at a fingerprint which adds more security than a typical credit card. The clerk doesn't even know what I used to pay All it knows is that the centralized device in the mall has completed a transaction with my device, tells them it has been paid for, downloads the transaction into my lifestyle device which will later sync up with my home computer so I have a running tally of everything I bought and then lets me go so the need for storage particularly in malls to all buy their own equipment can start to be ignored. You can start to buy centralized equipment and clear through that as one single location.

VB: Finally, let's turn to the future. One of the articles notes that mobile Internet era we're headed into is vastly different from the fixed Internet we've known. I think you touched on that in your last answer but can you tell us more about what that involves and what you've seen from companies working on some of these wireless applications?

Asmundson: Any time you get into a new technology like this you have some inherent problems. And one of those is that there's going to be a lot of overhype. And some of my last answer is somewhat overhype and under delivery in terms of services. And I think you've got most of the big wireless carriers. I think mostly being led by companies now like a Verizon Wireless who are coming out with some new Internet applications. They have the new data service. In fact, I have that right now. And it is quite frankly, cool, but that's all it really is right now. It's fairly limited. It's sports scores. It's news flashes. It might be some customizable financial data but it's not the whiz-bang exciting stuff. It's the same thing we can get in the wired world. So the question is when does the wireless world appear for the Internet. And there are some limitations. And those limitations right now will be the actually viewing screen and how it will be impacted and what can you really do with it. I think we all have to remember that this is an evolving area and it is not going to be the wired world and it shouldn't be the wired world. It should be more transaction-based as I was just talking about. But some of the other exciting applications start to come when you start to think about things like location. Often when you are in a wireless world you are mobile and in fact in Europe they don't even call it wireless. They call it mobile. Once you're mobile you get to the issue of where are you located because it's always nice to know where you are and so tracking services will start to become much more available as time goes on. The ability, for instance, if I'm siting in my office and myt lifestyle device now has my schedule it it, it knows I now have a o'clock flight out of San Francisco. It also has to know I'm in my office at 50 Fremont and it, through my schedule, knows I plan to leave at 1:30 . Well, there might be a tracking service that can tell there's a back accident on 101 and traffic delays are up to 45 minutes. So my phone buzzes me and tells me I'd better leave at quarter to one if I plan to leave at my schedule time. So those types of services can be very beneficial.

VB: Phil Asmundson, that you for joining us today at Solution Provider University.