Time to Reboot Your Company?

For better or worse, the wireless business is becoming a computer business. The key component in digital cellular, PCS and E-SMR products is software. These days, a radio manufacturer's most valuable human asset is its programmers.

Software rules. Various manufacturers often use the same hardware -- chipsets -- inside their products. The only qualities that differentiate handsets are the plastic housings and software codes. A really good software engineer is someone who uploads his work as an e-mail attachment via high-speed satellite link from a cabin in the wilderness.

The wireless business has changed dramatically over the last 10 years. What used to be stodgy companies selling ruggedized products to industrial-strength users are now market-savvy vendors that offer hot pink pagers and vending-machine cellular phones to Generation X.

But don't be fooled: The transition has been anything but graceful. Motorola and Ericsson each have stubbed their toes more than once. A couple of years ago, users complained bitterly about Ericsson's digital dispatch-radio system. More recently, PrimeCo gave Motorola its pink slip. In both cases, the biggest problem apparently was unreliable software.

SQUASHING BUGS Most computer companies learned long ago that no software is 100% bug-free. The best way to avoid serious problems is to test the software like crazy before releasing it, closely monitor its performance in the field and make sure that when the software crashes -- which it inevitably will -- the system can be reset quickly and easily.

But we shouldn't be too hard on Motorola and Ericsson. Both firms courageously ventured into the digital domain, knowing it would entail financial risks, not to mention a big dose of culture shock. They both have demonstrated the commitment and ability to get it right eventually. After a slow start, Ericsson became king of the GSM hill. And Motorola's E-SMR equipment, once given up for dead, has Nextel and other operators soaring.

There is also an upside to the computerization of the wireless business. It's creating a new world of opportunity. If everything runs on software, then new capabilities can be developed continually for existing hardware -- often just by modifying or adding to existing code. Features can even be downloaded to customers from the Internet or over the air.

THE LAST MILE The wireless last mile is going digital at a faster pace than the wireline last mile. Short message service, wireless e-mail and customized information services are just the beginning. Handsets that were once merely untethered telephones soon will be Internet dataphones.

As a cordless extension to the Internet, the handset is a portable computer with a ready-made killer application: voice communications. But telephony will not be the only application. Web sites aimed specifically at wireless users will spring up. A beep will notify you of an incoming e-mail message. Push 1 to discover the sender, 2 to read the subject line, 3 to redirect it to the nearest fax machine or 4 to have it read to you by a text-to-speech server.

The performance of wireless networks and handsets also will be software-driven. New algorithms will enable existing base stations to pick up faint signals from deep within buildings. Wish your battery could give you an extra hour of talk time between recharges? Not to worry. That's in the next handset software release. We will download it to your phone while you are sleeping.

The next big step may be cellular/PCS data cards that plug into notebook PCs, automobiles, vending machines and who knows what else. Area codes will split every other month to accommodate the tens of millions of things that will account for the bulk of subscriber growth.

If you don't believe all of this, look at what computerization has done to other products. Just a few years ago, a fax machine was just a fax machine (requiring that annoying thermal paper). Now you can buy a plain-paper fax that serves as a scanner, copier, computer printer and potato peeler. Yet prices have declined. Most important, now everyone has one.

THE SKY IS THE LIMIT The same thing will happen to computerized wireless handsets. They not only will be phones, but they will permit you to record conversations, listen to a time-delayed narrowcast of your daughter's piano recital or drop in on your son's Little League game (watching it via wireless videoconference using your phone's virtual display) when you can't be there in person.

For third-generation skeptics out there, wireless handsets are already computers -- replete with microprocessors and memory. Soon, with more powerful input/output capabilities, they will be portable multimedia PCs. One thing I have learned in my 20 years in telecom is that no matter how much bandwidth you give computer users, they promptly invent applications to fill it. Before you know it, they are begging for more.

Also having spent several years in the modem industry, I remember when certain manufacturers -- may they rest in peace -- insisted no individual could possibly need more than 1,200b/s. Their argument sounded fairly persuasive at the time: "No one can read or type that fast." After all, 1,200b/s is the equivalent of 120 characters per second. But when you are trying to find my office, and I ask where you are, you'll be glad I can see your current location through your handset's built-in camera.

The evolution of the wireless business into a computer business will require some difficult adjustments. But it also will open a new world of opportunity.

Brodsky is president of Datacomm Research Company. He can be reached via e-mail at ibrodsky@ix.netcom.com.