WSJ oon line article on Wingcast:
Qualcomm, Ford Plan to Start
Joint Venture With Telematic Unit
By REBECCA BUCKMAN, PUI-WING TAM and KAREN
LUNDEGAARD
Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
Ford Motor Co., finally muscling into the emerging
market for in-car communication services, is expected to
announce a joint venture Monday with Qualcomm Inc. to
deliver wireless services to automobiles, including a
mobile-phone service, according to people close to the
deal.
The move is Ford's long-awaited leap into so-called
telematics services, which include bringing phone,
Internet, entertainment, navigation and safety services to
vehicles. Rival General Motors Corp. offers some of
those services now through its OnStar unit. Onstar and
the Qualcomm-Ford venture, tentatively called Wingcast,
will now become rivals in the contest to define
standards and brand-name power in the emerging
mobile-commerce market. Auto makers believe
telematics and mobile commerce will be a lucrative
source of revenue, assuming government concerns about
the safety of on-board communications devices don't
limit consumers' ability to use the new services.
Wingcast will be based in San
Diego, where
wireless-communications
powerhouse Qualcomm has
headquarters, people close to the
deal said. Ford, Dearborn, Mich., is expected to be the
largest shareholder, and the company could soon grow to
about 300 employees, one of these people said.
Wingcast's chief executive is expected to be former
Microsoft Corp. Vice President Harel Kodesh, who led
Microsoft's wireless efforts until his departure earlier
this year. During his tenure, Microsoft experimented
with in-car computing technology through a project
called "AutoPC." The project is still active but is now
housed outside the wireless group.
Wingcast systems could be rolled out in one million
Ford cars in model year 2002, according to the people
close to the deal, and included in another three million
Ford vehicles the following year. By 2004, every Ford
car could be equipped with a wireless system, these
people said.
Besides Ford, the fledgling company already has another
customer: Nissan Motor Co. plans to integrate Wingcast
services into its Nissan and Infiniti brands, the people
close to the deal said.
Until now, Ford has moved more cautiously than GM
into the potentially lucrative telematics business through
a limited deal with Sprint Corp. For the 2001 model
year, basic in-vehicle communications systems will only
be available on Ford's Lincoln brands and European
Focus model. It isn't clear what will happen to Ford's
relationship with Sprint once Wingcast launches.
Meanwhile, GM is targeting more than one million
subscribers to its OnStar service by the end of this
year-services are already offered on 27 models.
Wingcast will develop a communication system based
on Qualcomm's CDMA, or code division multiple
access, wireless technology, the people close to the
venture said. Other vendors will work with Wingcast to
make the system's hardware, which will include devices
attached to the inside of cars as well as mobile phones
drivers can take with them.
Most of the system's data will be stored on a central
computer server, however, and not in the Wingcast
devices. That means drivers will be able to access the
service from inside their cars, from their phones or even
from a home computer, the people close to the deal said.
A driver looking for a car in a crowded parking lot, for
instance, could use the Wingcast mobile phone to
automatically honk the car's horn or turn on its lights.
When high-speed networks replace today's slower
Internet connections, Wingcast could introduce even
more advanced services, such as entertainment. One
example: A driver sitting at home at night in front of a
personal computer could program the kind of music he or
she would like to hear on a car's digital music system the
next morning -- or, perhaps, use voice-recognition
technology to simply talk to the in-car system.
The system will also be designed for safety, so that
Wingcast would automatically call 911 if a car's air bag
deployed.
When asked about Ford's seemingly slow pace into
telematics at a press luncheon earlier this month, Brian
Kelley, Ford's vice president in charge of e-commerce
strategies, said speed wasn't the issue in this race. Ford
plans only a "very thin layer of this technology in the
vehicle," he said. "But the real changes and the real
upgrades occur on a network that sits outside the car."
Mr. Kelley offered other hints as to how Ford might
approach wireless car services. Consumers want a
flexible, portable system they can upgrade, he said. And
as for other, fancy services, consumers in focus groups
said they valued safety most. That way, "when the air
bag deflates … instantly someone [would] show
up on the scene," Mr. Kelley said. "And then what will
happen is the navigation and the information and the
entertainment."
Car makers are salivating at the chance to have a
constant revenue stream from consumers, compared with
the one-time sale price they now receive. GM has
predicted revenue from such ventures could ultimately
hit $1 billion annually, though the company is still
heavily subsidizing OnStar.
Wingcast is expected to offer several different
subscription offers to people who buy a new car, much
like the different calling plans peddled by wireless
carriers, one person close to the project said. The most
basic ones would focus on emergency services, while
consumers would pay more for entertainment options or
more minutes on their mobile phones. Because the
service would include basic wireless service, Wingcast
could compete with other carriers, though it would also
have to partner with them to get airtime for its customers.
Write to Rebecca Buckman at
rebecca.buckman@wsj.com and Pui-Wing Tam at
pui-wing.tam@wsj.com and Karen Lundegaard at
karen.lundegaard@wsj.com
My comments. Incremental 300-400 k chipsets for 2001, 1MM plus for 2002 and 3-4MM in say 2004 and beyond - plus a likely piece of the subscription revenue.
Anyone know annual sales of Ford and Nissan combined.
RE: Onstar. Whose system does it use?
Do you think their might be an G* option for those who trave l off the beaten path? |
