This week it’s only fitting that we talk about the CTIA trade show and convention at the Sands Expo Center here in Las Vegas, NV for “Wireless Wednesday”. After all, I am here at the show, and I want to share with you some of the cool and exciting things I am seeing here.

Below are just a few things from the show I found interesting–

Digital Wallet from Boost Mobile

Sprint Nextel’s prepaid arm, Boost Mobile, is taking its own stab at the digital wallet. The company on Tuesday unveiled its Boost Mobile Wallet program, which is an Android application that allows its prepaid customers to manage their funds, transfer funds, send money overseas, and pay bills.

To read more about this, click here.

Ruby LTE Hotspot from Yota

Remember Yotaphone, the twin-display Android smartphone (color LCD in front, e-ink in back)? Today at CTIA in Las Vagas, Yota devices, the company behind the innovative handset, introduced Ruby, a sleek LTE hotspot with a small e-ink screen. We don’t usually get too excited about such devices, but Ruby looks like something out of Jony Ive‘s workshop, with some interesting features to match. The design recalls the iPod mini but is made of white plastic instead of aluminum.

To read more about this, click here.

And of course…

Us, Wilson Electronics!

Are you here in Las Vegas? If so, make sure and stop by our booth (#1242) to say hi, and learn more about our products, like the Sleek 4G.

This week for “Wireless Wednesday” we’re talking about an article from @FierceWireless about what is coming down the line next for smartphones. Check out the list they complied pasted below–

Durable screens and components
One of the biggest pain points for consumers is that their smartphones, worth hundreds of dollars, have glass screens that shatter easily. Corning has made a name for itself with its Gorilla Glass, but Gorilla Glass can still break under certain circumstances and it’s not in every phone. How can smartphone makers improve on this point? According to those in the industry: By making phones softer, not harder.

Recon Analytics analyst (and FierceWireless contributor) Roger Entner explained that a softer device would be better because “then it bends, rather than breaks. Hardness is good up to a point.”

And it’s not just the glass screen that would have to be more resilient. “It’s the rest of the components. That’s really the challenge in making a flexible phone; it’s not just the display and different layers of the display,” said Reticle Research analyst Ross Rubin.

Current Analysis analyst Avi Greengart said that if consumers buy a phone with a two-year contract, the phone needs to survive for the duration of the contract. He noted that there are many ruggedized phones on the market today but many are big and chunky. “I’m waiting for [a handset maker] to step up and say, we will guarantee it will last the two-year contract,” he said. “We know this is important.”

Better battery life
The holy grail of the smartphone experience is a long battery life. Getting a smartphone to last through the day in the face of heavy usage is critical. Yet there only seems to be incremental improvements on this front. Current Analysis analyst Avi Greengart pointed out that Motorola Mobility has already produced smartphones with exceptional battery life in the Droid Razr Maxx and Droid Razr Maxx HD (both phones have exceptionally large batteries: 3300 mAH). Yet Greengart noted that both phones were sold only through Verizon Wireless (NYSE:VZ), which limited their impact on the market.

Researchers always seem to be cooking up ways to make leaps in battery life. In 2010, a Swiss research team announced work on ways for nanotechnology to improve the efficiency and battery-life of mobile phones and laptops ten-fold. In 2011, researchers at Northwestern University devised a new form of lithium-ion batteries that they claimed could last 10 times longer than current batteries and be charged 10 times faster. The researchers said at the time that the batteries could be on the market in three to five years. And Recon Analytics analyst Roger Entner pointed to research that shows ambient radio waves can be used to extend battery life. “It’s like another antenna that absorbs the energy from the radio waves and turns it back into usable power,” he said. Reticle Research analyst Ross Rubin said he is unaware of any breakthroughs in battery life that are coming to market, though he acknowledged research is ongoing. “The challenge is commercializing it,” he said. “And it becomes difficult to do it reliability or inexpensively enough.” Greengart said that if Motorola does “have a superphone coming out and it has better battery life, that’s definitely something you can advertise.”

Contextual awareness
What if your device could pick up the questions you’re asking around you, and load an app or make a search query without you directly touching the phone? What if it just knew what you wanted? “The devices are becoming more and more context aware,” said Recon Analytics analyst Roger Entner. “That one is going to be very difficult because context is one of the most difficult things for anybody, even people, to detect.”

Currently, simple contextual awareness can trigger smartphone behaviors: the phone’s accelerometer can detect that a user is traveling at more than 50 mph, so it goes into “car mode,” for example. Current Analysis analyst Avi Greengart said that advances in contextual awareness will come in part from advances in sensors and in part from software built in the core of a platform’s operating system, as well as from applications. He noted that Motorola is already working on this to a certain extent with its Smart Actions, which can be finely tuned and adjusted by users to trigger a variety of actions if certain conditions are met.

IDC analyst John Jackson said advances in sensors, especially biometric ones, will bring added contextual awareness. “It will know when you pick it up what your mood is,” he said. “It will know when someone else is carrying it because of the way it moves around,” which could potentially enhance security. Still, he acknowledged that “contextual awareness is hard.”

However, Entner pointed out one potentially significant drawback to contextual awareness: If a phone is constantly listening and sensing what a user is doing, and is constantly pinging a data network as a result, it will generate a great deal of signaling traffic, and that could cut into–you guessed it–battery life.

Phones as information collectors 
Most people tend to think of phones as devices that individuals interact with personally, usually via touch input but also increasingly via voice. But what if phones could be something else: both more peripheral to a user’s mobile experience and more important in a larger context?

Reticle Research analyst Ross Rubin said that in the years ahead phones could mainly remain in users’ pockets, delivering information instead to a wearable device. Indeed, many expect in the years ahead smart glasses and watches will grow into a significant market.

What features would you like to see in your next phone? Let us know in the comments, or on Facebook/Twitter.

To read the rest of this article or to see it in its original context, click here.

This week for our “Wireless Wednesday” post we’re looking into tablets. Check out this article from @FierceWireless which explains where tablets are headed in the future.

Cellular-capable tablets will generate a total of $20 billion for wireless operators in 2017, according to research firm Strategy Analytics, due in large part to operators’ efforts to encourage subscribers to activate LTE connections on tablets through shared data plans.

“Mobile broadband tablets represent an important incremental growth opportunity for wireless operators. While direct mobile broadband subscriptions on tablets represent less than 10 percent of the total tablet installed base in 2012, they were a key driver of positive postpaid net additions at leading operators AT&T and Verizon Wireless in Q1 2013,” said Susan Welsh de Grimaldo, director of Wireless Operators and Networks at Strategy Analytics

Strategy Analytics forecasts global mobile broadband subscriptions on tablets will grow eight times from 2012 to 2017–as more than 165 million new tablets activate mobile data services.

Interestingly, Strategy Analytics predicts tablets will generate around 3.5 million terabytes of mobile data traffic in 2017.

The findings are notable considering that most tablets today connect only to Wi-Fi networks. The situation has robbed wireless operators of additional revenues they had hoped to obtain from users connecting their tablets to cellular networks. The reason, not surprisingly, is that users generally did not wish to pay for another line of service specifically for their tablets.

What do you think of this news? Do you have a tablet?

To read the rest of this article, or to see it in its original format, click here.

Welcome back to our weekly installment of “Wireless Wednesday.” Today we’re talking about a huge announcement made today by Microsoft about the new Xbox coming on May 21st! Take a look at the excerpt posted below from @Gizmodo.

The next Xbox is on its way. Microsoft sent out invitations Wednesday to a press event at its Redmond, Wash., headquarters. Promising “A New Generation Revealed,” the May 21 event is expected to be the launching ground for the next-generation Xbox.

A Facebook page for the event also suggests that, much like Sony’s recent PS 4 announcement, the event will be streamed online so fans can participate as well.

Microsoft was originally rumored to be announcing the console, codenamed Durango, in April. Earlier this month, however, that rumored date was pushed back to May, with a holiday 2013 release.

All the action is set to take place May 21, starting at 10 a.m. PDT.

Are you excited for the next generation Xbox? What do you hope to see included in the new model? Let us know in the comments, or on Facebook/Twitter.

Welcome back to our weekly installment of “Wireless Wednesday” blog posts! This week we’re talking about mobile music and where it’s headed. @FierceWireless came out with a fantastic article that discusses this very topic. Take a look at the excerpt included below–

 The digital music industry, which relies heavily on the mobile channel, is already a fractured and intensely competitive market. There are established players like Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), which provide devices and music libraries; streaming music services from Pandora, Spotify and Rdio; operator-run initiatives like Leap Wireless (NASDAQ:LEAP)subsidiary Cricket’s Muve Music; and device-specific initiatives such as Samsung Hub and Nokia Music.
The current frontrunners in the streaming mobile music segment are Pandora with over 67 million reported listeners in the U.S. and Spotify with over 24 million listeners worldwide. Both services are available on the desktops as well as multiple mobile platforms. While a majority of listeners use their ad-supported service, Spotify claims to have over 6 million paying subscribers for its ad-free streaming music service.

And it appears the market is set for even more upheaval: Rumors continue to hint at a wide variety of companies planning to enter the digital music market or existing players poised to expand their offerings.

As the market continues to grow, it’s worth taking a look at the key issues that are hounding the development of the market and the dynamics that could affect both existing players and new entrants:

Is Google too big to succeed in mobile music?
Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) has been rumored to be expanding its presence in the mobile music scene. The company already offers Google Music, which allows users to upload up to 20,000 songs from their own music libraries and stream them via compatible devices for free. Now there is talk of Google expanding its foray in music to include a subscription streaming service.

Mark Little, consumer analyst at Ovum, believes that Google’s new music streaming service will launch this autumn and dent the growth of Spotify and Apple’s iTunes by taking a significant slice of the $5.6 billion digital music market. However, he sees a number of obstacles in Google’s path. For one, he noted record labels’ concerns about Google: “They won’t want another Apple with significant market power and negotiating advantage.” Secondly, he said that consumer privacy concerns about a Google-branded subscription service handling users’ personal data could be on an issue.

Reflecting on these issues, Little hedges his bets: “Given the length of past negotiations with Apple and Spotify, the launch of a fully thought through Google music streaming proposition in September might be a little optimistic.”

Will users favor subscription or radio models?
Ben Arnold, director of industry analysis at The NPD Group, said Pandora has established itself as the leader to beat in the mobile music space. Its large installed base and the popularity of its app make Pandora almost as ubiquitous as Netflix is for video at this point. Indeed, according to NPD, the free version of Pandora led all streaming music services in during the fourth quarter, representing 39 percent of usage among Americans 13 to 35. However, Arnold sees people moving towards Spotify and points to the success of Spotify’s subscription model (Spotify has 6 million customers paying $10 per month, whereas Pandora’s customers predominantly use its ad-supported service). In Arnold’s opinion, consumers no longer need to own the music they listen to. “The model has gone from own to rent.”

Arnold added that an Internet radio service on its own is not enough to satisfy users’ music appetites–audio enthusiasts want to listen to an artist’s entire album, not just hit singles.

Nokia’s head of music, Michael Bebel, disagreed. Bebel explained that in Nokia’s research, “the highest use case out there was in radio,” which is why the company’s Nokia Music platform concentrates on curated playlists.

Arnold said that, although Spotify really started the music-to-rent trend, it’s not clear which vendor will ultimately dominate the space. Further, he said pricing for the service could evolve. For example, users might be willing to pay more for high-fidelity streaming music (256 kbps encoding) and less for a lower-quality stream. But, as with any streaming service, the quality of the sound would be dependent on carrier networks.

Will social media influence user preferences? Patrick McMullen, Senior Analyst at Fizziology, an analysis firm that focuses on evaluating social media to predict trends, felt that Spotify’s success was, in part, due to its deep Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) integration. Spotify enables the listener to share music and play lists with one’s Facebook friends and see what they are listening to in real-time. This whole process enhances the music experience.

Both Spotify and Rdio offer Facebook integration, allowing users to see what their friends are listening to in real-time. But McMullen said the social capabilities associated with Rdio weren’t up to the same standard as Spotify’s, which could be a disadvantage for Rdio going forward.

Of course, the intersection of social media and music isn’t for the faint of heart. For example, Apple last year shuttered its Ping social-networking service, which was built around the music available in Apple’s iTunes program. Apple’s failed Ping adventure remains a key signpost on the road between music and social networking.

Nonetheless, it’s clear that the integration of social media into the music experience will be a key element in the market in the future. Indeed, Netflix is already working to integrate Facebook into its video service.

Will preinstalled music apps have a leg up? While companies like Spotify and Pandora work to urge users to download their apps, others will be able to simply push their streaming music services directly into users’ lives. Apple is reportedly planning to launch its own streaming music service that the company could install directly onto iPhones and iPads via a software update.

Similarly, Amazon, with its Kindle devices and music catalog, could also give a streaming music service a preferential position on its own platform, thus locking in its customers right away. But both Apple and Amazon would need to provide a good product and not rest on their past reputations. Apple’s advantage would be its large mobile user base, while Amazon’s advantage would be that its users don’t install as many apps and would be more likely to use a built-in streaming music app, noted McMullen.

Will competition give rise to partnerships?
Abel Nevarez, a research analyst with IHS Screen Digest’s Mobile Intelligence group, said that carriers, music service providers and platform/device manufacturers could look to form alliances in order to break into the global mobile music market. Such partnerships could also allow carriers to retain a position in a market increasingly driven by over-the-top (OTT) providers like Google.

Nevarez cited a number of current partnerships as possible examples of the future to come. He pointed to Microsoft’s partnership with Pandora for Windows Phone and Samsung’s deal with Universal Music for the carrier O2. Another key example in the partnership department is the teaming between Spotify and Deutsche Telekom–under the agreement, DT will bundle Spotify’s Premium service into users’ bills, and Spotify traffic won’t count against a user’s data allotment.

Indeed, some carriers are using streaming music as a way to set themselves apart. Leap Wireless launched its Muve Music service in 2011 in order to tap into subscribers’ desire for a simple and inexpensive music service–today the service counts more than 1 million subscribers. Now Leap plans to license Muve to other carriers. Nevarez said Muve Music could be particularly successful in emerging markets where prepaid services are popular.

Will Apple’s alleged price negotiations hurt it in the long run?
Like Google, Apple is reportedly in negotiations with record labels to license music for its forthcoming ad-based music streaming service. The New York Post reported that Apple wants a rock bottom price of 6 cents per 100 songs streamed–half of what Pandora negotiated several years ago. Spotify is reported to be paying 35 cents per 100 songs, while the lowest rate set by the Copyright Royalty Board’s is 21 cents per 100 songs streamed.

Apple’s launch of an ad-based service would have a ready market in its large installed base of iOS devices and on its iTunes desktop applications. Moreover, listeners on those devices and applications would be well-positioned to purchase and download a song after listening to it on the ad-based streaming service–the extra revenue would be music to the ears of Apple’s shareholders.

But Apple could be stymied if it continues to push for inexpensive licensing terms.

What do you think of the points made in the article? Let us know on Facebook/Twitter.

To see this article in its original format, click here.

Hey folks! This week for Wireless Wednesday we’re celebrating the fact that exactly 40 years ago today, the first call on a cell phone was made. Whoa! Can you believe it’s been that long?!

Check out the following excerpts included below from this CNN article titled, “The first call from a cell phone was made 40 years ago today”.

Martin Cooper changed the world when he made the first cell phone call 40 years ago.

The former Motorola vice president and division manager made the call on the company’s DynaTAC phone while standing in front of the New York Hilton on Sixth Avenue. His first call: to the head of research at Bell Labs, a company that also was attempting to build the first cell phone.

Cooper’s call did more than untether people from their fixed phone lines; it opened the door to true mobility and continues to affect virtually every aspect of our lives.

Long gone are the clunky phones, such as the DynaTAC, or the large cell phone famously used by Zack Morris on the television sitcom “Saved by the Bell.” In their places are sleek smartphones and tablets with massive brains and access to a super-fast wireless connection. People don’t just use their mobile devices to make phone calls. In fact, they do a lot less of that now. They use their phones to browse the Internet, order delivery food, play word games with each other, and keep up with the ever-increasing tsunami of e-mails and text messages.

Cooper remains a revered figure in cell phone history. He had another moment to shine at Motorola’s Razr event last fall. When current Motorola executives introduced him, the throngs of jaded bloggers and reporters stopped their typing to pay their respects for his accomplishments

What year did you get your first cell phone? Let us know in the comments section or on Facebook/Twitter!