Emerging Mobile News As the top executive of AT&T Inc.'s mobile division talked about new gadgets and strategies at the wireless industry show this week, he slipped in a surprise: The Google Inc.-backed Android mobile software likely has a future on some AT&T phones. "I was concerned that maybe they were just going to focus on Google applications, but they're going to open it up and allow us to be able to customize" an Android device, said Ralph de la Vega, president of AT&T Mobility. "I am more impressed than ever that I think that's going to be a good option." Even though Google isn't exactly in the wireless business, that hasn't stopped it from spurring industry-wide change as it seeks to expand its reach to mobile devices. "We'll continue pushing to help make the wireless world look much more like the open platform of the Internet," Google attorneys Richard Whitt and Joseph Faber said Thursday in a statement about a recent radio spectrum auction.
In that auction, Google put billions of dollars on the line to get the government to impose new wireless open-access rules. More recently, the company has pushed to turn vacant television channels into a new medium for Internet access. It's also reportedly a potential investor in a next-generation wireless network. "They've had a tremendous impact," said Avi Greengart, mobile device research director for Current Analysis Inc. "They view the wireless industry strategically as a platform that they have to play in. They look at the future of the Internet as moving mobile." When it comes to advertising, Google's core business, a mobile user is more valuable than a person sitting at a desk because he or she is more likely to immediately need and use information, Greengart said. "Google's strategy basically is: 'Bet on every horse and add horses to the race as necessary,' " he said. Google made a bet worth more than $4.6 billion during the auction of radio airwaves that will become available next year as TV stations switch to digital broadcasts. Although Google didn't win any airwaves, it helped persuade the Federal Communications Commission to require that the winner of a huge part of the airwaves let subscribers use any wireless devices and software. Verizon Wireless won those and other airwaves with bids worth $9.4 billion.
The carrier said Friday it would use the airwaves for a next-generation high-speed data network using Long Term Evolution, a technology that will be ideal for connecting electronics including phones, medical devices and gaming consoles. "Verizon changed its whole philosophy" about open access in advance of the auction, said Tole Hart, an analyst with the Gartner Inc. research firm. U.S. carriers traditionally have tightly controlled the devices and applications allowed on their networks. "Partly as a result of our bidding, consumers soon should have new freedom to get the most out of their mobile phones and other wireless devices," Google's attorneys said. Until last week, federal rules prohibited auction participants from talking about it in detail. The Internet search leader also is pushing the government to open up unused parts of the TV spectrum so they can be used for mobile broadband. Other supporters of the effort include Microsoft Corp. and Dell Inc. The unused spectrum offers "a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to provide ubiquitous wireless broadband access to all Americans," Whitt, Google's telecom and media lawyer, said in a letter to the FCC last month.
TV broadcasters, who are worried about radio interference, have opposed the proposals. Recent news reports also have named Google as a potential investor in a project led by Sprint Nextel Corp. that would deploy a nationwide network using WiMax, a high-speed and long-range wireless technology often called "Wi-Fi on steroids." "What we've seen in the wireless industry over the last 20 years has been companies that have all followed the same path," said Jeff Kagan, an independent telecommunications analyst. "Everybody has taken the same path except Google. Google comes in with an entirely new way of thinking."
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