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Core Dump
Core Dump RSSStephen Withers turns his gaze on the world of Apple, with detours into other aspects of IT and communications as they catch his attention.
Technology news and Jobs arrow Our Blogs arrow Core Dump arrow iPhone is the last 'must have' handset, says analyst
iPhone is the last 'must have' handset, says analyst E-mail
by Stephen Withers   
Monday, 30 June 2008
Carriers may have been working hard to gain the rights to sell Apple's iPhone, but the idea of exclusive access to particular mobile phone handsets is on the way out, according to an analyst.

"In every market around the world we have seen headlines on feverish bidding by communications carriers to secure the rights to the iPhone," said Bruce McCabe, managing director of S2 Intelligence.

"Within three years, however, the notion of telecommunications companies trying to secure an advantage through exclusive rights to a handset will be dead."

McCabe points to three factors that will drive this change: Android (and similar relatively open platforms), virtualisation, and cloud computing.

I'll deal with what I think is the least important first.

Even though McCabe is looking three years ahead, I'm not sure that virtualisation will be a big deal. Firstly, the CPUs used in mobile handsets are relatively low performance parts. Virtualisation, especially where it is also necessary to emulate different hardware, is a big ask. And even if you want to run HTC's software on a iPhone or iPhone software on a Touch, why do you think the companies would allow it?

Doing the work in the cloud is going to be more significant, but we're not there yet. Look how much outcry there was when the original iPhone required that third-party applications be web-based rather than running directly on the handset.

What about virtualisation. and why do I think Android is the key to McCabe's argument? Please read on.



 
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