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VIRTUALISATION Smartphones: Wi-Fi or not Wi-Fi, that is the question
VIRTUALISATION Smartphones: Wi-Fi or not Wi-Fi, that is the question | Smartphones: Wi-Fi or not Wi-Fi, that is the question |
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| by Stephen Withers | |
| Monday, 13 July 2009 | |
  
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"Sprint is embracing WiFi in all its major devices going forward," he told Fierce Wireless. (Clemow explained that as far as the Tour was concerned, "Speed to market ... outweighed the desire to wait for WiFi.") There are good reasons for wanting Wi-Fi on a smartphone. Not least is that unless you carrier provides an affordable 'illuminated data' plan, it's usually cheaper to use Wi-Fi when you're at home or in the office, or - subject to security issues - when you're in range of a free hotspot in a hotel, cafe or similar location. Another is speed. Depending on your carrier, network congestion, and the speed of the Internet connection behind the Wi-Fi router, there's a good chance that WLAN will outperform wireless broadband. So it seems strange to read that the company behind one of the most popular smartphones is prepared to drop Wi-Fi in order to enter a big market. According to BusinessWeek, Apple has lodged an application with the Chinese government for a network access licence for an iPhone variant that lacks Wi-Fi capability. BusinessWeek quotes Matt Mathison, an analyst at Wedge Partners, as saying "Apple was hellbent on having the iPhone be Wi-Fi enabled. The Chinese government has been just as adamant that it not be." There has been speculation about whether this is due to the government's 'security' concerns or a determination to maximise the use of China Unicom's data service. State controlled China Unicom is the likely iPhone partner in China. Wedge's prediction is that the iPhone will go on sale in China by February 2010. |
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