Mobile data Wireless companies pitch stock quotes, e-mail and more
via cell phones, pagers and PDAs
San Jose Mercury News - Published Monday, May 24, 1999
A pocket-size communicator becomes, in effect, a mobile computer, but
with only a few of the functions of a PC.
Wireless companies pitching data services
ADEPT at delivering voices and digits, wireless phone and paging companies are
starting to offer their customers something more: Internet-style data.
These new services include stock quotes and trades, personalized alerts, e-mail, news
updates and pared-down World Wide Web sites. In essence, they transform a
pocket-size communicator into a mobile computer, albeit one with few of the functions
of a PC.
Such things have been tried before, with unimpressive results. And some industry
insiders question whether consumers will accept not just the compromises in screen size
and ease of use, but also the higher cost of the Internet on a wireless device.
''People who think browsing from a phone using a keypad and a tiny LCD screen is
going to be a satisfying experience, these are people who haven't taken their meds,''
said Anthony N. LaPine, chairman and chief executive of DataLink.net of San Jose.
LaPine runs one of several companies developing a new approach to wireless data, one
that tailors services to mobile phones, pagers and personal digital assistants. Rather than
connecting users to the full-blown Internet, they pass on just those bits of information
that the users have said they want to receive.
For example, subscribers could track an online Furby auction, getting alerts and making
new offers as the bidding rises. They could be notified as soon as a pre-selected stock
has reached the desired selling price. Or they could be warned when their flight to
Chicago is delayed by bad weather.
''Our thesis is that if it's not time-sensitive and it's not user-specific, people are not
going to want to be bothered,'' LaPine said.
''This is not about (Web) surfing,'' said Ben Linder of Phone.com, a Redwood
City-based company whose software enables mobile devices to display data. ''This is
about the timely delivery or surgical extraction of critically important, valuable material.''
A mobile phone, he added, ''knows where you are, it's able to receive alerts, and it's
always with you,'' which makes it the perfect target for some data services.
These services have been multiplying for the past year, as two-way pagers started to
grow in popularity. They're expected to get a major boost later this year as mobile-phone
carriers -- including all of the ones in the Bay Area -- expand into new data arenas.
One motivating force for carriers is the competition that has driven down the price of
conventional mobile-phone service to a nationwide average of less than $40 a month.
''Voice has become a commodity,'' said analyst Jane Zweig of Herschel Shosteck
Associates, adding that carriers are looking for new sources of revenue and competitive
advantage.
The growing use of the Internet for communications and information, meanwhile, has
boosted many users' interest in staying online wherever they go.
''For a huge number of business people,'' said Rob Keller, director of business
marketing for GTE Wireless, ''the content of their e-mail is mission-critical.''
As a first, small step into data services, wireless companies have been enabling portable
devices to receive and, in some cases, send messages. But consultant Gerry Purdy of
Mobile Insights in Mountain View said messaging service has been only ''marginally
successful'' in the United States, largely because ''it just hasn't been rolled out to a large
part of the population.''
The main appeal is the low cost -- between 1.7 and 7 cents per message -- and the
unobtrusiveness.
''If you're in a meeting, it's sort of disruptive if somebody calls you,'' said Bill Carney
of Synopsys, a Mountain View software company, whose assistant sends schedule
updates silently to his Sprint PCS phone.
A business tool
Bob Pacheco of San Jose, who signed up for Pacific Bell Wireless short messaging
service last year, said, ''It's turned into a reasonable business tool. I can tell my boss,
'Meeting went well,' that kind of thing.''
Wouldn't it be easier just to call your boss, Bob? ''That's what some people argued to
me . . . (but) the fact of the matter is, using the text messaging, you don't take up
airtime.'' Nor do you incur long-distance charges when sending messages across the
country.
Still, typing on a 10-key phone keyboard is so hard, it's impractical to send long
messages. Nor can many users receive long messages, given the limits on the wireless
phone networks.
Beyond messaging, wireless companies are gearing up to offer two more advanced types
of data service: linking people to key elements of their companies' computer networks,
and enabling them to collect and respond to information they value. In both cases the
first users are likely to be mobile workers, particularly those who need to be kept on a
short electronic leash.
AT&T has been offering these sorts of services since late 1996, when it launched
PocketNet. Used mainly with specialized mobile phones, PocketNet enables subscribers
who pay about $30 a month to tap into their online schedule and phone book, send and
receive e-mail, access their companies' networks, and view stripped-down Web sites
with news, financial headlines and sports scores.
Several analysts described PocketNet as a complete failure, with Zweig putting the
number of subscribers nationwide at under 20,000. Tom Trinneer, director of product
strategy and planning for AT&T Wireless, disagreed, saying his company ''made a
strategic decision'' to ''get to market first and fastest and learn.''
Trinneer argued that what AT&T did helped the whole wireless industry by spurring the
development of key technology and protocols. Had AT&T not done PocketNet, he said,
wireless phone manufacturers wouldn't be talking about putting a scaled-down Web
browser in every phone, as they are doing now.
E-mail and calendars
Regardless of PocketNet's performance, Microsoft Corp. certainly is sold on the idea of
letting workers connect wirelessly to corporate networks. It has announced two major
initiatives that would, among other things, let workers retrieve e-mail, schedules and
phone numbers with their mobile devices.
For casual mobile-phone users, a more appealing service may be ''push'' or alert
services, which use the messaging system to deliver snippets of information about
pre-selected topics or events. For example, Pac Bell is trying out a $3.95-per-month
service that sends users short updates on news, stocks, sports, weather or horoscopes
one to three times per day.
DataLink offers a more customizable -- and more expensive -- version, which can be
used with any mobile device capable of receiving data.
Another example is a new service from SkyTel, a paging company, and eBay of San
Jose, the leading online auction house. The service sends short messages to mobile
phones, pagers or other wireless device, telling consumers when they've been outbid
and when they've won an auction. Bidders with SkyTel two-way pagers can also make
new bids wirelessly in response to an alert.
A third example is a customizable alert service that Tibco Software Inc. of Palo Alto and
Fast Search & Transfer ASA have developed. Users describe the events they want to be
notified about, and Fast and Tibco monitor a steady stream of data to determine when
those events occur.
For instance, you might want to track how the Giants are playing, how specific stocks
perform, what the weather is like in a distant city, or where the wrecks are on Interstate
880.
Tugrul Firatli, vice president of networking and telecommunications services for
TIBCO, said the key is enabling people to target the service at their particular needs and
interests. That's why carriers are trying to tailor the new information services to the areas
they serve, he said, adding, ''Regional news, community news are going to be
extremely important.''
Pulling data
Nick Jenkins, data products manager for Pac Bell Wireless, said his company's
notification service will eventually become interactive, allowing users to pull out specific
pieces of information on demand. For example, he said, they could type in a stock's
ticker symbol and get its price quote, or enter a ZIP code and get the weather forecast for
that city.
That's still a messaging service, though. Other carriers are looking to move a step
beyond that, enabling people to browse all or part of the Web on their cell phones -- a
path already trod by the PocketNet service.
Doing so requires a special type of Web browser, one tuned to the postage-stamp
screens of mobile phones. Although some of the phones on the market today can be
equipped with this software, many cannot. And even if your current phone can be
modified for browsing, you may want one of the pricey new ''smart'' phones for the
sake of a larger screen.
''We believe we're going to start seeing those en masse toward the end of the year or
early next year,'' GTE's Keller said.
Zweig and Purdy, however, warned that consumers may not like the limited view of the
Web that the wireless carriers present.
Both analysts point to the ''Web clipping'' service offered by 3Com Corp. for its new
$600 Palm VII hand-held computer as an example of a company choosing data for the
users, rather than users choosing for themselves. By contrast, the Qualcomm pdQ
phone, a combination of Palm Pilot and wireless phone, will let users go to any Web site
and download text, albeit without the accompanying pictures or sounds.
The price for the pdQ phone, scheduled for release in the next few weeks, will be set by
the carriers. It's likely to be one of the most expensive ones on the market, though,
running somewhere between $500 and $1,000.
No Bay Area carrier has yet announced support for the pdQ phone, but Purdy said he
expects Sprint will do so in the fall. Keith Paglusch, senior vice president for operations
at Sprint PCS, declined to give specifics about the company's plans, saying only that it
expects to offer two-way messaging, ''push'' services and some Web browsing at some
point in the future.
Palm VII users will have a choice of two levels of service, $9.99 and $24.99 per month;
heavy users will find themselves paying more for extra minutes.
o~~~ O |
