Mobile Broadband alliance on track for Christmas
Expect a slew of mobile broadband-ready laptops by Christmas. They’ll be the fruit of an alliance of chip makers, mobile phone makers and PC manufacturers to push mobile broadband to the laptop.
According to the BBC, the key to the mobile broadband objective is by creating wireless modules embedded into laptops, ensuring the machines will support mobile browsing. Laptops with the chips bult-in will bear a special mark, something like Intel’s chip branding stickers, to show that they will work with third and fourth generation wireless technology. 91 nations will likely have access to those laptops by Christmas.
“Mobile Broadband” logo carrier machines will not only have modules that will boost third generation speeds, but will also be compatible with upcoming fourth generation technologies. Speeds will also be fairly impressive, according to Mike O’Hara, a spokesman for the GSM Alliance. "It’s comparable to fixed broadband services and close to what you get in a wi-fi hot spot," said O’Hara. Eventually, O’Hara said the laptops would be available alongside mobile phones.
Vodafone’s Hugh Padfield, principal manager for PC connectivity said: "The important thing for us is to make it as easy for customers to buy mobile broadband." He said that the branding scheme and logo would help assure customers that the laptops would work with future mobile broadband services.
"It will help to create even more momentum than what we have already seen with mobile broadband," said Padfield.
GSM Alliance helped broker the deal to produce the modules, embed them into laptops as well as the Mobile Broadband logo campaign. 16 firms in the Mobile Broadband alliance have pledged around £554m ($1bn) to promote the logo as well as educate customers about the technology. So who’s in on the deal? Laptop makers Dell, Toshiba and Lenovo as well as the telcos 3, Microsoft, T-Mobile, Ericsson, Orange, Qualcomm and Vodafone. As mobility becomes more than just a business concern, perhaps more consumers might see the convenience of being able to surf literally anywhere…so long as you have a mobile signal.
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