Wireless

As consumers increasingly purchase sophisticated smartphones such as the iPhone, BlackBerry, and Droid, they are developing expectations for how these phones allow contacts, calendars, e-mail, and social networks to remain in sync across all their devices.

One of the big challenges is that users don't always maintain the same source of inputting data--they switch from browser to desktop application to smartphone as their data access and entry point, introducing many variables into the data chain. And data integrity will only get more complicated as more applications become browser-based and keep no local data storage.

Most enterprise users have a local store in addition to the cloud storage, something that I still find puzzling from the T-mobile Sidekick outage, where consumer data that should have been in multiple locations (or at least present on the device) was thought to be lost.

The most common sync services are not provided directly by the mobile operator. Generally this is a good thing, as the more you can dis-intermediate the carrier, the more control you have over your data. But because the sync services are provided by others--notably Microsoft, Google, and Apple--you end up locked-in to their data structures as well as whatever privacy and data management issues that might arise in relation to advertising or other usage of your information.

Today, you can fairly easily sync your mobile device with most common online e-mail and PIM services although the BlackBerry, Droid, and the iPhone differ in their approaches--or at least in the visibility of how they work. For example, you can sync with Gmail and other services on the iPhone, but it rather perversely requires the Microsoft ActiveSync protocol.

By controlling the address book, Google and Apple effectively lock-in users to their sync service, leaving the carriers and devices to be easily replaced (minus the cancellation charges.) The user would barely notice the difference, aside from the sticker on his phone that says AT&T or Verizon.

Mobile operators do not want to cede control of the address book to Google or Apple, but they are late to the game and do not yet have sync solutions of their own. As a result, they are scrambling to add this functionality, but building a sync solution that works with all different devices and email services is no easy task, thanks to the widespread problem of device fragmentation in the industry.

One option is to deploy a white label solution, like the open mobile cloud sync offered by Funambol. Funambol CEO Fabrizio Capobianco told me the company has been approached by many of the top mobile operators, with several of them looking to setup sync services for their customers. They all recognize the issue, and according to Capobianco can turn to Funambol as a way to quickly bring a high-quality solution to market.

With all the different players in mobile sync, users will begin to question who owns their data. Enterprise users, in particular, should have privacy concerns about trusting their data to someone else. In the case of Android users, there is a growing anti-Google sentiment, and if Google already owns your email, calendar, and search queries, do you really want them to own your phone contacts as well?

Consumer demand for smartphones seems to be unstoppable.

In the third quarter, vendors shipped a record 43.3 million devices, up 4.2 percent from last year's third quarter and up 3.2 percent from this year's second quarter, says a report released Thursday by market researcher IDC.

(Credit: IDC)

Among smartphone vendors, Nokia still enjoys the greatest market share, according to IDC, with a 37.9 percent slice for the third quarter. ... Read more

I'm sure you've heard of Apple's App Store for the iPhone. But have you ever heard of an independent mobile app store called GetJar?

No? Well, that's not surprising. The tiny company now based in Silicon Valley has done virtually no marketing. And yet in the nearly five years it's been around, the company has managed to build the second largest application store front for mobile phones in the world, likely making it the biggest mobile app store you've never heard of.

The privately held Getjar claims it has nearly 57,000 applications in its store, making it second only to Apple in terms of total applications. Apple just announced this week that it now has more than 100,000 applications in its store.

Google's Android Market, which launched earlier this year has more than 10,000 applications. Research in Motion's BlackBerry App World has just more than 2,000 applications available today, according to estimates.

Since Getjar's virtual store went live in early 2005, about 650 million applications have been downloaded. And momentum has been growing. For the month of October, Getjar executives say the company saw its users download 55 million applications, which is a 267 percent increase over the same month a year ago when 15 million mobile applications were downloaded. And the company says that it has more than 300,000 registered developers uploading applications to its site.

Meanwhile, Apple's much-hyped and heavily marketed iTunes App Store, which is nearly twice the size of Getjar, as of September had more than 2 billion app downloads since the store was launched in July 2008. And executives at Apple recently said the company had 125,000 developers on its roster. By comparison, the Android Market has had an estimated 40 million downloads since it went live earlier this year.

GetJar got its start not as an application store but as a beta testing Web site for mobile developers. GetJar founder and CEO Ilja Laurs had started the site to allow developers a way to test their applications on a variety of handsets.

"Originally, we were trying to help developers who couldn't get access to certain phones for testing," he said. "But then developers came to us and asked if they could use the site to also distribute their applications."

And so the GetJar application store was born in early 2005. At first, the site attracted mostly hard-core mobile application fans. But over the years, word of the site has spread, and users all over the world come to GetJar to download different applications.

Unlike most of the other application stores that have been announced recently, GetJar's store offers mobile applications for almost any phone.

"With the GetJar store, consumers don't have to worry about whether they have an Android phone or a Java phone," said Patrick Mork, vice president of marketing for GetJar. "They don't need to know which model Nokia they have. We take the fragmentation out of the equation by auto-detecting what apps can run on which phones and offering consumers those applications."

The way it works is that GetJar is able to detect the type of phone a wireless subscriber is using when they connect to the GetJar mobile Web site. It can also detect the type of phone used from the regular Web site using a wireless subscriber's phone number.

A screen shot of a GetJar download page for the Facebook shortcut link.

(Credit: GetJar)

Based on this information, GetJar is able to direct app shoppers to the applications that will work on their phones.

"If there is a BlackBerry app available and you are using a BlackBerry you will get that application," Mork said. "But if you're on a feature phone, you'll likely get a shortcut link."

This is yet another important differentiator for GetJar. Unlike device or operating system specific app stores, such as Apple's App Store or Android Market, GetJar also provides millions of consumers using basic feature phones an app-like experience, even if a specific application hasn't been developed for their particular phone.

For example, GetJar has worked with Facebook to provide a downloadable shortcut link that leads to the Facebook mobile Web site for wireless subscribers who are not using a smartphone for which a special Facebook application has been developed.

While the link is not really a native application for that specific device, the link appears on the phone's menu and provides access via the phone's browser to a mobile Web site. For consumers, the experience is very similar to that of a native application that has been downloaded to a smartphone.

"Facebook didn't have a strategy for developing applications for Motorola Razrs and Samsung Instincts" Mork said. "So they teamed up with us to get around that problem by providing short cut links. It's really not an app. But the beauty of it is that it allows any company to play in the app game from a shortcut."

And for brands, such as Facebook, the shortcut increases their mobile presence. Before it started working with GetJar, Facebook would get between 100,000 and 150,000 downloads per week from its mobile site. After the shortcut, links were available on the GetJar site and on Facebook's site, Facebook started to see 1.5 million mobile downloads per week, Mork said.

But GetJar does have some limitations. One major limitation for consumers in the U.S. is that GetJar cannot offer applications to most phones operating on Verizon Wireless's network. The reason is that Verizon uses a closed platform called BREW on many of its phones. And there is no way for third-party application developers to create applications for these devices without going through Verizon's BREW approval process. But BREW is a legacy platform for Verizon, and newer smartphones on Verizon, such as BlackBerry devices and the new Android phones, will be able to access applications from GetJar.

GetJar also doesn't explicitly serve apps to iPhone users, again because the iPhone platform is closed. But iPhone users can use the GetJar store to discover new applications and GetJar can redirect those users to the Apple App Store, where they can download the applications.

Yet another limitation is that GetJar does not offer developers the ability to charge for applications. The company has not yet figured out how to bill for these applications. Instead, application developers can monetize their applications by incorporating advertising into the application or using the app on GetJar to up-sell consumers to a more robust application in a different application store.

But GetJar does allow developers to promote their applications, and the company has developed a marketplace so that developers can bid for top promotional spots on the Web site. GetJar gets paid based on how many users download these applications. Most other application stores today do not offer developers a way to promote their applications, which makes it difficult for smaller developers to get their applications noticed.

While there is no question that Apple dominates the mobile application market today, Mork admits that Apple's push into applications has been a boon for GetJar, and likely for other app stores.

"It's undeniable that Apple has had a positive effect on our business, especially in the U.S.," he said. "But we don't really compete with Apple. Still, it's clear that the mass market is just starting to catch on. And that is largely thanks to the success of Apple and its App Store."

The creator of PhoneSnoop shows how the free spyware app works in a video on his blog.

(Credit: Chirashi Security)

The U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team warned BlackBerry users on Tuesday about a new program called PhoneSnoop that allows someone to remotely eavesdrop on phone conversations.

The PhoneSnoop application must be installed on the phone by someone who has physical access to it or by tricking the user into downloading it, the CERT advisory said.

The author of the app, Sheran Gunasekera, director of security for Hermis Consulting in Jakarta, Indonesia, says it wasn't written to do any actual harm, but rather to warn of the dangers that still exist with the BlackBerry.

The application can be used by anyone to spy on any BlackBerry user's phone. However, Gunasekera says it is not hidden on the device after it's installed, so users should be able to easily see it.

"My intention was to raise awareness that even though the BlackBerry is one of the more secure platforms, there are still means where its users can be spied upon," Gunasekera wrote in an e-mail on Tuesday. "I wanted to highlight that even with such technical security controls, the human element can be exploited through social engineering."

To aid BlackBerry users who asked him how they could protect themselves from being snooped on, he said he released on Tuesday another free tool called "Kisses" that will detect and display hidden programs on the device.

On his blog, Gunasekera explains how PhoneSnoop works.

"PhoneSnoop sets up a PhoneListener and waits for an incoming call from a specific number. Once it detects a call from that specific number, it automatically answers the victims' phone and puts the phone into SpeakerPhone mode," he writes.

US-CERT said BlackBerry users should only download applications from trusted sources and password protect and lock the devices to prevent someone from installing unwanted software.

The issue of BlackBerry snooping made headlines this summer when Etisalat, a carrier in the United Arab Emirates, sent SMS messages to BlackBerry subscribers encouraging them to download a patch that security experts said was spyware.

SMobile Systems did a technical analysis of the software and concluded that the "true nature of the spyware is to intercept BlackBerry users' email messages and forward the messages to a monitoring agent inside the Etisalat network," according to the BlackBerry Cool blog.

Vonage Mobile for the iPhone, iPod Touch.

(Credit: Vonage)

Voice over Internet Protocol service provider Vonage on Monday announced that it has launched its first mobile apps for the iPhone, iPod Touch, and BlackBerry devices.

Dubbed Vonage Mobile, the company's free VoIP app enables users to place international calls from their mobile devices. iPod Touch owners can do so by placing calls through Wi-Fi. BlackBerry owners will transmit calls over the cellular network only. iPhone owners will be able to place calls from Wi-Fi or through AT&T's network.

According to Vonage, its app will help users save up to 50 percent on international calling charges levied by carriers. After downloading the app, users need to enter an international number. They can also select a call recipient from their existing iPhone or BlackBerry contacts list. Those who receive calls will see the user's cell phone number on their caller IDs. Charges will be taken against the user's credit card, which they need to input when they first start using the app.

For now, Vonage is offering per-minute rates. The company said in a statement that by the end of the year, it will offer the Vonage World plan to users. Vonage World for home users currently allows them to make calls to more than 60 countries for $24.99 per month.

Vonage's app launch comes on the heels of controversy over whether Google's similar Voice app should have been denied access to Apple's App Store. The debate still rages on.

Vonage's new mobile app is available now in Apple's App Store and Research In Motion's BlackBerry App World. Both versions are free.

Apple's iPhone and Android-based smartphones have both seen solid growth throughout the world this year, says a report released Wednesday by AdMob.

The iPhone's worldwide market share jumped from 33 percent to 40 percent over February to August, according to AdMob's "August Mobile Metrics Report," which tracked smartphone usage for that six-month period. AdMob, which serves ads for mobile Web sites and apps, bases its numbers on data from ad requests, impressions, and clicks.

Phones running Google's Android OS picked up a 7 percent market share by August versus only 2 percent in February, thanks to rapid gains in North America and Western Europe, said AdMob. Since its debut this summer, T-Mobile's Android-powered MyTouch has been a top seller in both of those regions.

(Credit: AdMob)

With the launch of the Pre, Palm's WebOS has also taken off, grabbing a 4 percent slice of the smartphone market in August.

Top smartphones across the world

(Credit: AdMob)

On the downside, older smartphone systems have witnessed a drop in market share, according to AdMob.

The global share for Nokia's Symbian OS fell from 43 percent in February to 34 percent in August. However, Nokia smartphones remain hot sellers, accounting for 12 of the top 20 smartphones tracked by AdMob. Nokia's N97 and 5800 XpressMusic units were the fourth and fifth most popular smartphones in the U.K. for August.

Research In Motion's slice of the market dropped slightly from 10 percent in February to 8 percent in August. Still, RIM's Blackberry devices accounted for three of the top 20 smartphones around the world. The Palm OS, running on older units such as the Centro, declined in share from 3 percent in February to 1 percent in August.

Finally, Microsoft's Windows Mobile also lost share, falling from 7 percent in February to 4 percent in August, according to the report.

AdMob sells and tracks ads on mobile Web pages and applications to more than 7,000 publishers. The company compiled the data for this report based on its analysis of more than 10 billion monthly ad requests from over 160 different countries.

The long-awaited BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac is finally at hand, Research In Motion announced Wednesday.

The new desktop software, designed specifically for Mac users, will be available as a free download on RIM's Mac page, starting at 10 a.m. PDT Friday.

BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac allows people to sync data with Mac apps for contacts, appointments, tasks, and notes. The software also allows people to schedule back-ups, encrypt files, and perhaps most importantly, install software updates for their BlackBerry devices.

RIM's new BlackBerry Desktop Manager.

(Credit: Research In Motion)

Apart from the business side of things, RIM said the software features BlackBerry Media Sync, allowing people to sync their iTunes music with their BlackBerry. According to the company, people can choose the playlists they want, and all the included tracks will be transferred to the smartphone.

BlackBerry Desktop Manager requires Macs to be running Mac OS X 10.5.5 or higher. Any stragglers still running Mac OS X Tiger or haven't updated their Leopard installations will be left out. The BlackBerry itself must be running BlackBerry OS 4.2 and higher.

BlackBerry Desktop Manager for Mac is one of the most anticipated releases from RIM in quite awhile. Unlike iPhone software, which works with both Mac and PCs, BlackBerry Desktop Manager has only been available for Windows users. Until now, a third-party tool has been needed for BlackBerry devices to sync with Macs.

Most new smartphone users are now consumers, a dramatic change from just a few years ago when the gadgets were primarily in the hands of business types, according to a survey released Wednesday by research firm CFI Group.

The survey "CFI Group Smartphone Satisfaction Study 2009" found that smartphone users are no longer just reading e-mail or scheduling appointments but also surfing the Web, streaming video and music, downloading games, and snapping pictures. Smartphones are now seen more by consumers as minicomputers than as cell phones, according to CFI.

Predictably, Apple's iPhone is credited with igniting the growth of smartphones, and it's the clear leader of the pack. The survey found that the iPhone has the most loyalty and praise among its users, with 92 percent of iPhone owners saying they have the ideal phone. Around 90 percent have recommended the device, while 35 percent said they bought the iPhone based on word-of-mouth advice.

The iPhone also is tops in customer satisfaction, ranking 83 on a 100-point scale, according to CFI. The newer Palm Pre and Android-based phones each scored 77 on the scale, followed by Research In Motion's Blackberry at 73 and the Palm Treo at 70. The rest of the pack, including phones running Windows Mobile and Symbian, trailed the list with an overall grade of 66.

(Credit: CFI Group)

"The iPhone is the best thing to happen to the smartphone industry because it captured the imagination of a whole new set of consumers that might not have made the smartphone jump," said Doug Helmreich, program director with CFI Group.

But the growing dependence on smartphones is a catch-22, since consumers now demand more from their devices. And wireless carriers, most notably AT&T, have struggled to provide the quality of service that people want. For this reason and others, the survey found a disparity between the most popular smartphones and the most popular providers.

Of the pack, Verizon Wireless was considered the ideal carrier among 86 percent of users questioned, and it scored 79 out of 100 for customer satisfaction. But only 38 percent of Verizon consumers said their phone is the ideal smartphone, the lowest among all carriers.

For AT&T, the situation is reversed, but more among iPhone users. Half of all iPhone owners surveyed said they would like to jump ship to another provider, but 75 percent of non-iPhone users said they would stick with AT&T. For customer satisfaction, AT&T scored 69 out of 100 among iPhone users, and 73 among non-iPhone owners.

(Credit: CFI Group)

The survey also raised the question of whether other carriers might take a hit as consumers continue to want more from the iPhone and its brethren.

"The iPhone raised the bar not only for other smartphones, but for the networks as well," said Helmreich. "The new breed of smartphone consumers expect more from their phones, and the iPhone may represent only the tip of a data-intensive iceberg."

To compile the survey, CFI Group questioned 1,074 people from August 3 to 10 about their smartphone use.

Updated at 3:30 p.m. PDT with information from the conference call.

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion on Thursday said it sold fewer BlackBerry phones than analysts had expected and that the company's quarterly earnings were hurt by a legal settlement.

Even though RIM still saw strong sales of BlackBerrys, the news sent the company's stock price tumbling in after-market trading. Many are now wondering if RIM's disappointing sales are an indicator of a wider smartphone slowdown or if the news is an indication that the company is losing its edge in an increasingly competitive market.

RIM's co-CEO, Jim Balsillie, said the company is still in very good shape.

"This stuff (smartphones and mobile applications) is going much more mainstream," he said during the conference call. "And we are teed up to go much more mainstream. If this crosses over, as I think we are doing, we are in a good position and a very prosperous position."

He told investors and analysts that they shouldn't look too deeply into the sales numbers for hidden indications of a market slowdown. And despite a lackluster forecast for the next quarter, he said sales are set to explode in the long term.

"I appreciate looking for trends," he said. "But I don't think you should extrapolate too much over a little bump here or there."

Balsillie said earnings fell 4 percent in the second fiscal quarter due in large part to charges associated with a legal settlement.

For the quarter that ended August 29, the company said it earned $475.6 million, or 83 cents a share, compared to profits of $495.5 million, or 86 cents a share, for the same period a year ago.

What really hurt the company's profits was a charge of $112.8 million related to the settlement of a patent dispute with Visto. Excluding this charge, RIM said it would have earned $588.4 million, or $1.03 per share for the quarter.

Revenue rose to $3.53 billion from $2.58 billion a year earlier. Analysts had expected earnings of $1 a share on revenue of $3.62 billion, according to Thomson Reuters.

RIM also reported that it shipped slightly fewer devices than what analysts had expected. The company said it shipped about 8.3 million BlackBerry devices during the quarter, adding about 3.8 million new subscribers. Analysts had expected the company to add about 4 million new subscribers on shipments between 8.5 million and 8.6 million.

RIM said it expects revenue of between $3.6 billion and $3.85 billion for the third fiscal quarter that ends November 28. And it expects earnings per share to be between $1 and $1.08.

These forecasts are slightly lower than analysts' third-quarter revenue of about $3.9 billion. And they wanted to see RIM add 4.3 million new subscribers instead of the 4 million to 4.3 million new subscribers the company predicts.

Although Wall Street was disappointed in RIM's results, the fact remains that the company is still growing handset sales. In fact, sales are up about 40 percent compared to a year ago. But because RIM has been known to have even higher growth rate, some analysts are disappointed with these figures and are punishing the company's stock, which had been up earlier on Thursday in anticipation of the company's earnings news. After the market closed, shares were down 10 percent or more.

So the big question remains: what do RIM's results mean for the rest of the industry?

RIM leads the market in smartphone sales in the United States. But the company has many competitors nipping at its heels. Apple has reported strong growth of the iPhone, especially its new iPhone 3GS, introduced in June. And there are new Google Android phones from HTC and Motorola coming to market soon.

Even the Palm Pre did relatively well during the second quarter, despite the fact that it was being exclusively sold on Sprint Nextel, the third-largest wireless operator in the country, which happens to continue losing subscribers every quarter.

So it's quite likely that sales of smartphones will continue to climb, as Balsillie predicts. But he admitted during the call that the challenge the company faces is in executing its strategy. This means making sure that RIM's latest products get out the door on time.

"I really like our strategy," Balsillie said. "I know we are doing all the right things. But we have a lot of execution risk...And who knows what's going to happen."

For his part, Basillie says the company is well-positioned for the upcoming holiday season with new phones such as the BlackBerry Tour and the latest BlackBerry Curve, which were introduced this summer. Analysts also expect RIM to launch the next version of its touch-screen BlackBerry Storm on Verizon Wireless before the end of the year.