Posted at 8:26 p.m. PDT Monday, July 5, 1999
Building wireless counter-revolution
Partnership wants to lead the way to new digital epoch
BY DAN GILLMOR
Mercury News Technology Columnist
LONDON
AS Americans took Monday off to celebrate their nation's declaration of independence, business as usual prevailed at the offices of Symbian Ltd. Independence of another sort was on the agenda for Colly Myers and his colleagues -- and the global technology consortium they represent.
Symbian (www.symbian.com) is actually something of a counter-revolution. Its partners, including most of the world's top cellular-phone companies, launched the venture a year ago. Their goal, in part, was to prevent Microsoft Corp. from someday dominating their industry as it now rules the personal-computer business.
Myers, Symbian's chief executive since late last summer, was one of the earliest employees of Psion, a company best known for its hand-held computers. Today, the software at the heart of the latest Psion machines, the Epoc operating system, is Symbian's principal asset.
The Symbian partners include Nokia (Finland), Ericsson (Sweden), Motorola (United States) and Matsushita (Japan), who together sell the vast majority of wireless phones. They see Epoc as the operating system that will control a new generation of wireless devices.
They envision a spectrum of ever-smarter digital cell phones and personal communicators. These information appliances will combine data and voice, computing and communications in ways we are only beginning to imagine. If we are indeed heading into an era in which the personal computer is only one way, and not typically the best way, of using data networks, the market for such wireless devices could be huge. The stakes are considerable, to put it mildly.
Microsoft is aiming a version of its Windows CE operating system at the wireless market. Myers almost casually dismisses CE as a player in the current race, noting its partial roots in the Windows operating system that monopolizes desktop computing and is making big inroads on the more powerful ''server'' computers.
But Microsoft's CEO, Bill Gates, told his staff in a 1998 memo that Symbian posed serious competition in the market where wireless services and computing converge. And Microsoft, which tends to get things right eventually, is pouring money, talent and evangelism into a wireless-savvy CE. The company is also buying its way into alliances with several companies delivering wireless services, including AT&T and British Telecom. (3Com's Palm hand-held platform, now being added to a Qualcomm wireless phone, is yet another potential player.)
Looking at the field, Myers and his colleagues know they're in for a long battle.
They have some edges on the competition, however, even apart from the strong endorsement by the world's major makers of wireless phones. One of the most important advantages is Europe's strong lead in wireless technology. U.S. digital-wireless standards are a hodge-podge of incompatible systems; Europe (and much of the rest of the world) long ago settled on a standard known as GSM. Symbian is supporting all major wireless standards, but its partners are moving first to market with GSM devices.
While the Symbian alliance is widely viewed in an anti-Microsoft context -- a recent deal with Sun Microsystems to bring Java to the platform heightened that perception -- a principal reason the partners chose Epoc was the technology itself.
''The prime attribute,'' Myers said Monday at his office here, ''is robustness.''
A cell phone or other (relatively) low-cost consumer device should never crash the way a typical personal computer does all too frequently. Consumers won't tolerate it, and companies selling the devices can't afford the support costs of unreliability. Myers says Epoc and its telecommunications partners have ensured a system that is both reliable and powerful enough to handle a variety of tasks.
Symbian's focus on the wireless and phone markets is another plus. ''It's very clear where we put our effort,'' Myers said in a slightly oblique reference to Microsoft's wish to dominate every kind of information system. That focus, he said, pays dividends as Symbian partners and customers extend the platform's capabilities.
By almost all accounts, Epoc is better suited -- today, at least -- for wireless communications and small devices than Windows CE. It saps less battery power and memory, among other advantages. It reacts in what is called ''real time'' to users' instructions, something CE can't do yet.
Another Epoc advantage over CE, at least to its owners, is the fact that it doesn't dictate the look and feel of the device on which it's based. That's essential to boost innovation while not undercutting device manufacturers' brands.
Ericsson has announced an early device based on Epoc. The MC 218 ''mobile companion,'' due to hit the market this summer, handles a variety of functions -- including e-mail, calendar and a phone book -- and is specifically designed to complement a wireless phone. For example, the devices will keep phone numbers synchronized. Ericsson's R380 mobile phone will build in the digital organizer, e-mail, etc., and is due to hit the market by early next year.
Putting all these functions into separate devices isn't difficult. Integrating them smoothly in one device or two, or more, that work seamlessly together is much tougher. That's Epoc's job, Myers says.
What will all of this mean to you and me? It's unclear, but some possibilities are already emerging.
When we're instantly on the network no matter where we are -- able to receive and send e-mail, make purchases and otherwise deal with a wide variety of information -- our lives will surely be different. We may well find ourselves turning the devices off, recapturing some private time, but we may also use those spare minutes to do chores that otherwise might pile up, Myers suggests. He calls those extra minutes ''slot time'' -- a new variation on Internet Time, I suppose. I worry: Being connected all the time, or merely available, is not my idea of an ideal life. Myers rejoins: ''What if you get an extra hour at home each day by using that slot time during the day?''
I'll believe that when it happens, but I'm looking forward to the flexibility of the upcoming digital epoch. Or is that Epoc?
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