This is my last weblog entry for 2006, where I'll share with you some thoughts about Mobility in the year 2007…

It has been almost a decade since I first realized the potential of mobile & wireless, and the impact it would have on our society. Back then I fell in love with mobile, wireless and embedded to the point that I decided to make it my career. The idea of "mobile gadgets" that people would carry with them everywhere, always connected, and use to communicate with others, and that can be programmed with applications and data while on the field, was just an awesome concept; as you can see, same concepts today but almost 10 years later. Back then were the days of CDPD, Mobitex, and HDML, RIM pagers, Palm OS and WinCE. Symbian OS, WAP and short-messaging were still kind of new here in the U.S.  Smartcards were a big deal and some of us spent a lot of time on them. The year 1999 came and the KVM and J2ME were introduced,
having a huge impact on the future of mobile/wireless. We did a lot of firsts on mobility with our partners, Sun and others invested millions on us, and we almost got acquired by BEA – but that is a whole different story. Back then I believed 2005 would be the year for mobile & wireless. I was close, but it wasn't the year; things have evolved slower than I had anticipated. Today I see 2007 as having the right ingredients for the birth of the next generation of mobility. Below are some of these ingredients:

  • Advanced feature-and-media-rich handsets and APIs, including the next generation of Java on handsets: MIDP3 and MSA
  • Fast and robust wireless networks everywhere
  • Personal or near field networks
  • Services, services: Services on the web, location-based services, open methods for service publish and consumption, collaboration
  • Open tools, platforms, protocols and APIs, services, Internet, Web and Mobile Web, including W3C standards for Widgets and W3C WICD Mobile
  • Messaging, and next generation messaging
  • The mobility community continues to grow: from developers to investors
  • People are getting it! User participation, user-generated content, collaboration, mass messaging/texting, high penetration of mobile handsets, the mobile lifestyle is happening!
  • Investors are getting it,  even outside Silicon Valley

2007 should witness the true birth of the next generation of mobility, as hinted by the Mobile 2.0 movement in 2006.

Instead of predictions for 2007, I'm going to share with you the top five mobility areas for 2007
as I see it:

  1. "advanced (multimedia) messaging”
  2. "mobile advertising and promotions"
  3. "mobile payments"
  4. "mobile directories and searching"
  5. "mobility + social  (user-generated content, collaboration)"

We will see a big push in these areas, but understand that the tipping points themselves are years away, some farther than others.  Note that I didn't say "mobile web" or "Java" or "native" or "widgets" — all of those are “channels” to deliver the above. Note that some of the above hot areas have challenges with respect to business models. For other areas to watch and be part of see Hot Areas in Mobility (to follow and be part of).
Note that the above are "verticals" in some respects, but what really will set or define the next generation mobility is the evolution of the mobile context itself and its effect on the mobile experience; the set of characteristics that span across verticals and defines the essence of mobility.

2007 is going to be (or should be) a good year for mobility, for those who decide
to seize the opportunity.

I want to wish you and your family a great and happy, productive, successful and healthy 2007!

ceo