By: MarkJ - 11 March, 2008 (8:37 AM)
The chief marketing officer of mobile phone handset manufacture Ericsson, Johan Bergendahl, has predicted that the growth of Mobile Broadband (3G) services will ultimately make
Wi-Fi Hotspots irrelevant:
"Hotspots at places like Starbucks are becoming the telephone boxes of the broadband era," claimed Ericsson's chief marketing officer Johan Bergendahl, speaking to delegates at the European Computer Audit, Control and Security Conference in Stockholm.
"In Austria they are saying that mobile broadband will pass fixed broadband this year. It's already growing faster, and in Sweden, the most popular phone is a USB modem," Bergendahl claimed.
Bergendahl pointed to Mobile Broadband's ever cheaper prices as a key factor for its success. He also noted how some laptop manufacturers are now building Ericsson's HSPA (3.5G) technology directly into their computers.
However, he admitted that issues with international roaming, specifically cost related ones, were still hindering the technologies potential. One recent Vodafone case, where a customer was charged £11k because his downloads took place abroad, highlights the problem (
here). More @
PC Pro.
History - [News Archives]