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Technology Stocks : Nokia (NOK) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wyätt Gwyön who wrote (2440)	9/30/1999 7:51:00 AM
From: tero kuittinen	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 34857

So you did manage to squeeze a Q in that post after all... that's very commendable. This M-commerce situation is heating up: sonera.fi Sonera is Finland's leading mobile operator - they'll enlist at Nasdaq this autumn. They have this very aggressive M-commerce and M-banking strategy... a development deal with Citibank, etc. The encryption technology they have developed is a key part of all this. It's aimed at making financial transactions via mobile phones safer than existing e-commerce. I think Sonera has a reasonable shot at turning their encryption technology into an industry standard. Obviously, close collaboration with Nokia R&D unit doesn't hurt. MeritaNordbanken already has 600 000 internet banking customers... they probably intend to convert many of those into M-banking customers ASAP. That's supposed to be the showcase that sells the concept to major mobile markets. Sonera should launch their WAP services tomorrow and a competing operator, Radiolinja should start their WAP operation next Wednesday. First 7110's are expected to be in the shops within 24 hours, so we're finally getting a sneak peek at how this stuff is received by consumers. WAP hype reached a fever pitch last July - and it's been growing since. What we're seeing is bigger anticipation for 7110 than for any other model since 6110 came out in February 1998. That's double-edged sword; when you crank up anticipation this much, there's always that backlash risk if everything does not proceed smoothly. I just don't think that North American CDMA market is ready for dedicated WAP models, chaz. When 3% of the population are CDMA subscribers, it is extremely hard to sell these models in volume. Neopoint and pdQ are not creating advance orders of hundreds of units in small retail outlets, like 7110 is doing. We're not seeing leading US banks, airlines and insurance companies reorienting their entire consumer services to accommodate WAP, as their Northern European counterparts are doing. What WAP probably needs is 20-70% of the population having a digital phone subscription and so theoretically within reach of WAP-based services. Otherwise banks and other major institutions just don't take the trouble to push the services - and ultimately it's the commerce that has to sell these phones. Reuters headlines only go so far. Tero