Thursday, August 23, 2012

Sprint & T-Mobile, wake up and smell the network sharing!

When Vodafone and O2 recently announced the merger of their 2G & 3G networks in the UK, as well as collaboration on 4G build-out, it meant that four out of five carriers in the UK are now part of network sharing JVs. This is part of an ongoing trend among wireless carriers in Europe and elsewhere, but so far, this trend has not reached the major carriers in the US.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Google Fiber, in defense of the open internet

Since Google Fiber was launched in Kansas City the service has gotten a lot of attention for its speed, ease of use and social approach to coordinating the roll-out. While I am sure that Google intend to make money on the service, I think the most important reason for Google to do this is separate from potential revenue on the actual service.

I believe that Google Fiber is a warning shot across the bow of the entrenched forces such as cable companies, wireless carriers, the entertainment industry and others that have for varying reasons worked in unison to roll back the openness of the Internet.

Companies like Google, Facebook, Twitter and even Apple can only flourish in an environment where the users have unencumbered access to the internet.

Remind me again, why do we have online piracy?

I'm sure you have an idea of why by now but even so, read this great summary in Scientific American, on how Hollywood is promoting online piracy.

Basically it comes down to protecting their existing "disc delivery system". This term may sound somewhat unfamiliar but I'll walk you through it.

Why Kickstarter is one of my favorite startups

Since crowd funding site Kickstarter launched about three years ago we have been able to follow the explosion of successful projects raising unheard of amounts of money without VC or angel involvement.

As an entrepreneur I find the Kickstarter success especially interesting, and probably in a way you had not thought or heard of.

Friday, August 10, 2012

Does Ouya spell trouble for Wii and later PS & Xbox?

Ouya, the Kickstarter gaming console startup which ended up raising about $8,6M is part of a new breed of startups like Pebble and TikTok. What sets Ouya apart from most other Kickstarter projects is that it appears as if it could have major strategic impact on existing market players such as Nintendo Wii, Sony PlayStation and Microsoft Xbox and cause further disruption within the gaming industry.

The gaming industry have seen increased competition and disruption over the past years, especially in the handheld segment where iOS devices have rapidly taken a large share of the market.

Startup ideas come in all shapes, forms and materials...

Check out this great article in Wired about wooden sunglasses startup Shwood. It may take a village sometimes, but apparently also a forest to build sunglasses. These guys are most definitely thinking outside the box.

Friday, August 3, 2012

The future of POS

According to a 9TO5Mac post, AT&T is testing out their next generation Point-Of-Sale (POS) environment in a number of stores and expect to complete the roll-out over a couple of years. The new environment would mean that AT&T moves from a desktop environment to an all-iOS environment where the store personnel are equipped with iPads as support for all tasks.

Thursday, August 2, 2012

Is the "new" MS Outlook webmail a threat to Gmail?

Microsoft yesterday launched the long-needed update to its webmail platform Hotmail. The webmail platform was also renamed to Outlook.com to give it a fresh start. In addition to the very well received user interface updates, Microsoft released a statement that they promise to refrain from scanning the users email for ad targeting.

It is obvious that Gmail is in Microsofts crosshairs but are the interface updates and the privacy promise enough for users to start leaving Gmail?