Barry Downes

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October 12, 2007

What does the iPhone mean for the future of mobile services?

So I am one of those lucky enough in Europe to own an Apple iPhone and I have used it heavily for the past three months and still love it. In my opinion the recent launch the iPhone, and in particular the YouTube service on the iPhone, has redefined what subscribers will expect from advanced mobile services in the future. Even though the iPhone is (in effect) a closed, propriety platform and the YouTube service on the iPhone has been highly customised for this one specific platform, the resultant user experience of the iPhone YouTube service is phenomenal – a major leap in the performance and usability of mobile media services. The result is that service providers should realise that any mobile service that they launch in the future will have to compete in this post-iPhone world and this raises serious issues and challenges as to how they should approach their mobile strategy.

These recent iPhone (YouTube and Google Maps) services parallel similar developments on the Web. The World Wide Web (delivered over broadband) originally signalled a decrease in the popularity of the desktop (thick client) application, as many comparable services became available online in the form of Web applications. However, despite this, many users felt that they were missing some of the usability that was engrained in the desktop equivalent. The Rich Internet Application (this term RIA was I believe introduced by Macromedia in 2002) has recently emerged to addresses these issues. An RIA is a web-based application that has the features and functionality of a traditional desktop application and although they can run inside a web browser (with the aid of Ajax, Flash and Applets), a truly integrated user experience often requires the installation of a thin client on the desktop (e.g. Apple iTunes, Google Earth).

GoogleMaps and YouTube on the iPhone use a similar approach: a thin client on the phone, server based technologies and rich web experience through Ajax to deliver an incredible mobile experience. The result is a new class of mobile application that goes beyond the capabilities and user experience of WAP and On Device Portals (ODP) to completely redefine the standard for compelling mobile services. As a result, these new iPhone services should be classed as a new category of mobile service – a Rich Mobile Internet Application (RMIA). The Apple and Google RMIA have effectively raised the bar for all new mobile services; even though they are effectively "hard-coded" to the iPhone.

The challenge for other service providers is to provide an iPhone/YouTube-like experience for their mobile service across Open Mobile Environments (OME), including IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem). As a result, a leading Internet Brand has turned to the Telecommunications and Software Systems Group (TSSG), as recognised leaders in the field of mobile and communications services, to help them with the research and development required to deliver a similar RMIA service for open mobile environments.

The goal of this joint research programme will be to analyse current and future technologies and trends to determine the optimum approach to delivering next generation RMIAs across open mobile environments (i.e. access network; core network – e.g. IMS; service delivery platform (SDP); and terminal operating systems, functional and development environments). Furthermore, the research programme will assess the companies requirements for its mobile service and create a service framework for OME Rich Mobile Internet Applications. The project will then validate this service framework with a demonstrator and the company will use this demonstrator to obtain market feedback (Operator and Subscriber), which will help further refine the results of the project.

We expect a number of mobile service innovations to result from this work and I look forward to highlighting them here over the coming months.

Posted by bdownes at October 12, 2007 2:47 PM

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