Ready Player oksusu Social VR?

Introduced at the 2018 Mobile World Congress, and launched two weeks ago, oksusu Social VR provides, as the name suggests, social interactions in virtual environments by leveraging SK Telecom's 10M-subscriber-strong OTT platform oksusu. The service works with Samsung Gear VR and Google Daydream headsets, and video quality is equivalent to 80-inch full HD, with potential upgrades to 8K (7,680 x 4,320) and 360-degree IMAX screens on 5G.

Of course, Social VR has a role to play to promote 5G, which SKT is expected to launch this December. From day one, the experience ticks all the boxes to fill bigger pipes: higher definition, enhanced interactivity for key verticals (music, movies, sports, games...), new mass entertainment, (social) network effect,...

Catch me if you can

What's interesting is the angle SKT used to market the new service in their PR release "From virtual reality to cinema dating reality" ("가상현실에서 영화관 데이트 현실로" - 20181011): almost a dating or date-enhancing app, for young Koreans to escape a distressing everyday life, and to become successful avatars in exciting virtual worlds.

'Second Life', meet Spielberg's 'Ready Player One'.

Granted, there are technical constraints, you'll have to wait for that sensitive suit, and for the moment, 'interactions' are basically what audiences are allowed to do IRL: discuss with their neighbors, change seats, throw popcorn at the screen. And to avoid inaudibility, only up to eight people can chat together while watching the same video contents in one of the 5 kinds of virtual spaces already available: living room, movie theater, performance hall, sports venue, and e-sports room. 

So couch potato goes VR, but that's the only the beginning. You can already watch NBA games on VR, and judging how GAFA joined the sports rights battle, more platforms will emerge. Including for amateur virtual space designers - think MySpace in the age of Google Sketchup and Google Tilt. I'm pretty sure Korea will soon have its fair share of the VR addicts I envisioned in my 1980s short story 'Lautriv'.

A couple of years ago, I was dragged to a hologram K-pop musical in Seoul, and most fans came in pairs or small groups of friends, enjoying the show almost as if it were the same thing. But you wouldn't have Beatlemania-level screams, which I think may happen in a soundproof environment many are used to: the noraebang or karaoke room they book for a couple of hours to let it go full throttle. I bet many of these facilities will add the VR experience, to spice up the karaoke (on stage with your idol), or simply for sessions of oksusu Social VR (or their likes) between friends. PC-bang may evolve differently, with smaller cells, and a focus on VR games and e-sports.

Anyway, you won't know what hits you until it's too late.

mot-bile 2018

IoT as in the 'Internet of Turds'?

If LG U+ got, as expected, the smaller chunk of 5G spectrum in this week's auctions, they sure made a splash with their connected bidet-toilets. 

* 

Let's start with these 5G auctions, where Korea raised 3.6183 trillion won from the 3 bidders, not even 10% more than the starting point of KRW 3.3 tn; just enough to show an illusion of fight. All 3 MNOs claimed 800MHz in the 2.8GHz spectrum, and in the 3.5GHz spectrum, #3 LG U+ got 80MHz compared to 100 for #1 SK Telecom and #2 Korea Telecom. 

Note that SKT just announced successful tests with Nokia on 3GPP-approved 5G SA (StandAlone), a national first following last December's world first on 5G NSA (Non-StandAlone). You can expect SKT and KT to launch on December 1st (the date the regulator set to allow service) to continue their battle over 5G leadership. They'll probably start on 3.5GHz, at least in the capital Seoul, and key entry points such as Incheon. 

* 

Now about that bidet-toilet thing. 

You first have to understand that many people in East Asia already enjoy electronic systems, complete with water noozles and seat warmers. Here, LG U+ teams up with Inus Bath to add connectivity to the Novita model:

This most essential innovation brings IoT to new territories (the 'Internet of Turds'?). From your smartphone, you can pre-warm your seats, or post-flush in case you forgot to do it. Each member of the family can instantly enjoy their preferred water temperature, pressure, or nozzle position, and you will receive alerts if you stay too long, because no one should be above the loo eternally. 

Mercifully, no cameras are connected so far, but in this over-connected country where last week, 20,000 victims of peeping toms demonstrated on the street, there were already cases of perverts installing spycams in public rest rooms...

In any case, paranoids should worry: LG U+ announced that A.I. will john later. Not Amazon's Echo (who wants more echo in this room, or Alexa sending your personal records by email?), but Naver's Clova: when it's (paper) rolled out, you can voice control this new sentient environment.

* 

The good thing with not being the highest bidder in an auction is that you're flush with enough money to become the highest bidet. 

Will LG U+ rivals enter this fascinating Game of Thrones? 

mot-bile 2018

Once GPON a time in the East

SK Telecom announced their 2.5 Gbps service over GPON (Gigabit-capable Passive Optical Network), 5 Gbps and 10 Gbps packages by EOY 2018.

SK Broadband already covers 40% of Korea, and targets 80% by 2020. Showcased in Pyeongchang* and at the recent Inter Korean Summit by KT, 5G shall be launched partly in March 2019 (3.5GHz and 28GHz auctioned), and nationwide in 2022. 

Don't worry about filling the pipes in a country that demands everyday faster services. The traditional mecca of extreme online gaming (MMORPG and esports) is getting addicted to blockchain and bandwidth-hungry services (MelOn HD, Amazon Prime...). If IPTV remains less popular than in France, subscriber bases keep catching up. SKT's broadband and mobile units now claim respectively 4.46M and 8.88M 'Monthly Active Users' (a 25.5% gain YOY for the latter, branded Oksusu).

SKT maintains its leadership over KT for another demanding service, A.I. assistants**: NUGU reached 3M users Q1 2018 (+9.6% YOY - 5M expected EOY), GiGa Genie 'only' 710k. And they are bound to leverage this key entry point in Korean households after the acquisitions of quantum sensing leader ID Quantique ('quantum-safe cryptography' from Switzerland), and the nation's second security service provider ADT Caps.

3M subs for NUGU, SK Telecom's A.I. assistant (presented here by plastic surgery - enhanced artificial assistants)

Anyway, SKT and KT are compelled to boost new streams of revenues: both posted small decreases in revenues following the switch to new accounting norms, and the sword of Damocles that has been threatening to strike them for 7 years might just do that: the Supreme Court confirmed that MNOs can't postpone anymore the slashing of their outrageously expensive plans.

mot-bile 2018

* see "South Cow-rea already cow-nected to 5G". Note that 77.9% of KT subscribers are already on LTE.
** according to them, people using simultaneously smartphones, fixed internet, and A.I. assistants at home will still enjoy more than 800 Mbps over GPON.

Moonshots and Wineyardshots - MWC meets Salon de l'Agriculture

Mobile World Congress 2018 was more about improvements than game-changing innovations.

As announced, LG abandoned the arms race to focus on software upgrades instead of new hardware. Now you can record their ultra-slomo evolution with your Samsung Galaxy S9 (+).

While Sony joins the headjack-free craze (Sony Xperia XZ2), Nokia slides back to Matrix, reviving its iconic banana (8110 via HMD Global).

And by the time Nok-Nok rolls-out a ultra-light 4G network across the Moon with Google and Vodafone, 5G will be all the rage at home.

Anyway, why wait for Audi Quattro rovers  to crisscross Earth's spinoff? VitiRover smart lawnmowers already roam French wineyards. This Saint-Emilion-based startup provides autonomous, solar-powered, A.I.-loaded marvels that clean the place without breaking a sweat. Bonus: they can survive - and even reduce - DNA-altering levels of pesticides.

Note that VitiRover's team also includes a human Robot Shepherd. A refreshing retro touch our scary A.I. era.

mot-bile 2018

CES 2019 - Driverlessly nuts

A power outage at the CES? In the heart of Neon City? 35 miles away from Hoover Dam? And, of all reasons, because of excessive rain? In the Mojave Desert? This is nuts.

Like LG's 65-inch roll-up OLED TV... totally nuts:

And how about ForwardX's CX-1, a driverless luggage that follows you wherever you go? Now if that one doesn't drive airport security people nuts... imagine the mayhem when hundreds of these suitcases roam their halls, and no one can tell who's 'carrying' what...

Can't get nutsier, you think? Consider this: Spartan underwear, radiation-blocking boxers from France, to 'protect your nuts' from harmful waves...

You've been briefed.

So what to expect for next year? The Crotch It, an ankle monitor that punishes convicted sex offenders as soon as they get within range of former victims? A Wonder e-Bra, to fend off potential Harvey Weinsteins, and keep them away from the Internet of Tits? The Locker Room Banner, a semi-A.I.-based app to automatically delete your account each time you post something offensive on social media*?

We'll see. So far, if CES 2018 didn't bring any of the 3 gizmos I expected last year (see"CES 2018: tighten your 2.5 ppm helmets"), we've already been graced with a lighter version of one of them: smart masks from R-PUR ('pure air' in French - yes, we frogs are not just into smarty pants)






mot-bile 2018

* by the way, Samsung built The Wall. A 146-inch modular TV. With Micro LED. Now who will pay for it?

South Cow-rea already cow-nected to 5G

Lazy MNOs usually settle for milking the cow, but SK Telecom is neither lazy, not your usual MNO. And in its latest presentation, the Korean leader suggested to IoT-ize the cow in order to generate new applications and revenues:

LiveCare: "oral implant of bio capsule in cow, extract real-time information through LoRa, provide analysis through Web/app, alert and message to farmer" - that was Korea's version of the classic 'you have two cows' parable.

Of course, LiveCare was only a niche app illustrating the way the MNO intends to leverage its core techno and infra (network, A.I., cloud, data) to boost new business (e.g. IoT, commerce, media).  

A couple of days ago, BT CEO Gavin Patterson called all players to 'build a strong business case for 5G', and measuring bovine farts doesn't exactly sound like the next killer app... unless you replace cows with humans, and alerts with A.I.-picked medical or culinary recommandations customized for your microbiome (expect more A.I. news from SKT, already present with NUGU or Aibril - the latter with IBM Watson -, and recently joined by Hyundai Motor Company, Hanwha Asset Management, and the Canadian Element AI in a USD 45M fund to invest in A.I. and smart mobility).


SK Telecom is already 'building a strong case for 5G', particularly with its rival KT about to showcase its own flavor during the Pyeongchang 2018 olympics. And SKT are not just into testing earlier than others (e.g. recently 4G LTE-5G internetworking, or VR 360 over 5G with Samsung tablet-size device), or even into going commercial earlier than others, but also into building a stronger 5G standard (e.g. recently pushed for 200 Gbps packet swiching), and a stronger technological environment around 5G (e.g. recently 4.8 Gbps WiFi with 802.11ax in Bundang, or 5G-PON / Passive Optical Network distribution).


'Building a strong business case for 5G' will be more fun for marketers. Even if it starts, as usual, like with 3G or 4G, with existing services that will saturate the previous generation anyway, like HD video these days, a booming category if we ever saw one. 

'Building a strong business case for 5G' will also demand a touch of emotion, so I'll finish this focus on SK with their latest ad for 5G. It features an endangered species, Jeju-do's haenyeo (female diver):




mot-bile 2017

Click and mortar v. Click and mortar

Where you live, where you work, and where things happen are not necessarily the same places. Yet, even as technology abolishes distances, major trends tend to emerge from creative ecosystems that are not too stretched.

The model becomes more challenging where real estate and technology bubbles coexist. Will San Francisco ever recover its soul? How long will Berlin or Montreal remain affordable? Artists can hop from Brooklyn to Queens or New Jersey, but can they still feel the vibes when they return to Manhattan?

All majors are building artificial ecosystems around new headquarters, following more or less open patterns (See "Google's Gtown wins over ZeeTown and the Large Apple Collider" after "Zee Talk of Zee Town").

Somehow, these utopian projects celebrate urban failures, a mutual transplant rejection.

If startup ecosystems often play crucial roles in urban regeneration, it's more complex for big players to play god beyond a simple hotspot, such as a Google Campus for instance.

Xavier Niel's Station F is truly monumental, but neither open, nor really connected to its direct neighborhood - how many smaller fishes will fray near this titanic aquarium? how far can it stretch and transform eastern Paris?

Talking about massive concrete platforms... I'm also curious to see how my beloved Seun Sangga will evolve. The city of Seoul wants to turn this whale of a building into a startup hub, leveraging its unique DNA. But can you force it down its throat? Can the fragile ecosystem survive storytelling, even well intended?

One thing seems clear: if good and sound urbanism can foster and nurture innovation, you shouldn't overplan, and you should make space not just for the insiders and outsiders, but also for the fifty shades inbetween.

mot-bile 2017

Comfort zones

Whiffs of déjà vu from Barcelona's Mobile World Congress: a Nokia 3310, a BlackBerry keyboard (KeyOne), and soon a Motorola DynaTAC Vintage Edition?

After sending millions on Pokemon Go quests, Nintendo Switch-es back to hardware.

Google plays its classic from-service-to-device branding gimmick, positioning Google Home + Google Assistant against Amazon Echo + Amazon Alexa.

Google Home had to extend its footprint before Samsung Assistant hits the shelves, and will reach beyond Android to tickle Apple Siri. Rumor (and Android Police) has it Google will be the first multi-user device on the market.

At this stage, it doesn't matter much if the platform remains Google-centric, with at least 9 in-house brands among the fist 30 partners:

out of 30 partners to date, at least 9 belong to google

Nevermind this gizmo: the A.I. behemoth is less venturing into new territories than trying to defend its comfort zone.

mot-bile 2017

* "Pitching Google Pixel in 3 strikes"

CES 2018: tighten your 2.5 ppm helmets

So you came back from Vegas with your LG bendable OLED screen (needed to wrap those smart gimbap rolls), your Hushme mask (needed to give Hannibal Lecter a call), and your Plume Labs Flow (needed a cheese grater that doubled as a air quality monitor).

Hushme mask (gethushme.com) allows you to mask your voice using various sounds (Minions, R2D2, rain, wind...).

Plume Labs Flow (plumelabs.com)

And you wonder what CES 2018 will bring you next year. Here's an exclusive preview of the 3 gadgets that will define the event:

• Xiaomi 2.5PPM Helmet: after purchasing Plume Labs and Hushme, the Chinese manufacturer created an air filtering mask with an airbag that inflates around your head as soon as nanoparticle levels hit the roof. In this safe bubble, the air is pure, your eyes don't hurt, and no one can hear you scream. 
• Alphago D-Bunk: this cloud-based A.I. service boosts your messaging and SNS apps, and sorts fake news from verified stories. Or at least it used to until Russia hacked it.
• Samsung Gear Fit Cuffs: clip the smartwatch on your left wrist, the other end of the handcuff on your right wrist. It beeps and flashes LED rainbows as soon as LEE Jae-yong moves 200 ft away from his cell.

mot-bile 2017

Quick, Draw! Help Google crowd-accelerate Singularity!

ICYMI, Google gamified its A.I. experiments with Quick, Draw!, a game where you have 20 seconds to sketch a subject recognizeable by their system.

quickdraw.withgoogle.com

aiexperiments.withgoogle.com

Of course, the more people play, the smarter the A.I., and the stronger Big G. A bit like they use Captcha to decypher ancient texts scanned by Google Books, only with countless more applications.

Help Google crowd-accelerate singularity and build A.I. dystopia by playing with its QuickDraw (twitter.com/stephanemot/status/799484363305992192)

Similar games can be imagined in 3D, VR environments (not just for Big G's Tilt Brush), your every stroke or move tracked by eyefluence, and so many completely different kind of games...

Now, playing kid stuff in a sandbox can help grow singularity monsters. 

Yesterday, a philosopher friend wondered if A.I. could create philosophical concepts, but Jorge-Luis Borges already answered the question decades ago. 

Simply by mapping and applying patterns from different panes, you can easily come up with strikingly beautiful concepts and conjectures that could keep experts awake for eternities. 

If you run out of A.I. systems or monkeys, even elephants will do:

Just don't forget to invite once in a while a Magritte to your Quick, Draw! games, or a Woody Allen to your Quick, Think! sessions.



mot-bile 2016

Pitching Google Pixel in 3 strikes

Google unveiled its Google Pixel and Google Pixel XL handsets.

What strikes first is the convergence of communication codes between Google, Apple, and Samsung, confirming the difficulties of differenciating in commoditization times. That said, Samsung has beefed up its human side, Google its pedagogy dimensions, and Apple... well Apple remained Apple.

What strikes next is the focus on image, from the name (Pixel), to the pitch ("highest rated smartphone camera", "Unlimited storage for all your photos and videos"). This is not only a Google Phone, but also a Google Camera, and a boost for Google Photos. The Pixel is marketed almost like a featurephone, with a message more... focused than its competitors, even if Apple did stress iPhone 7's "advanced new camera systems", and even if Samsung's ill-fated but polyvalent Galaxy Note 7 offered new arguments ranging from sensors and lenses to Samsung Cloud.

The third strike comes from Google Assistant. We knew it existed, we knew it had in its DNA the capacity to help you defeat LEE Sedol*, but its namelessness makes it an even scarier A.I. monster, plugged to both your personal environment (controled by Big G), and to Big G's phenomenal reach in queries about anything, anytime, on any platform. Yes, Siri has a name, but its brains have just been purchased by Samsung, who snatched Viv Labs, the startup created by Siri founders.

But if one player has been struck out here, it seems to be - for the moment at least - Andromeda: the OS of Google Pixel is Android 7.1 Nougat, not Google's hybrid Android-Chrome OS. And Pixel was the perfect alibi, since the brand was introduced on Chromebook...

For Google, launching a competitive smartphone was probably more urgent than rolling out its new convergent OS.



mot-bile 2016


* see "Man v. Machine, Garry v. Gary"

The Special G Diet Plan

Mercury News reported that Google paused the roll out of its Google Fiber network across the Silicon Valley, and considered wireless (mmWave) instead of fixed (FTTP) for building connections. Big G purchased last June* Webpass, an ISP operating in 5 markets including the Bay area, and proposing both fiber and point-to-point wireless broadband solutions.

 
Google can use unlicensed spectrum and get a significant base to test broadband services, particularly for companies. These small, captive cells could become interesting entry points for 5G, without waiting for WAN technos to emerge. 

Will Google Fiber have to rebrand itself? Well you always need some for the backbone. And since Alphabet is also into medical fields, they already know that one fibers can't be digested, and two fibers can facilitate digestion.

Webpass won't be the last one to be wolfed down.

mot-bile 2016


* " Google Fiber agrees to acquire Webpass" (Webpass - June 22nd, 2016)

Now MAP me: Facebook testing OpenCellular

A promising start-up is "Introducing OpenCellular: An open source wireless access platform", "an open source and cost-effective, software-defined wireless access platform aimed to improve connectivity in remote areas of the world", "supporting everything from 2G to LTE".

This Mobile Access Platform prolongs the equally open Telecom Infra Project, and sports the same green-white-blue colors.

Green white blue? Is this humanitarian NGO from Sierra Leone?

Well that's tree hugger green, open source white, and Facebook blue. Spot the oddball. 

Facebook, the control freak of your personal data, wants to be a driving force in next gen wireless through the whole value chain, and Zuck doesn't want to miss a beat (see "Networks: the TIP of Facebook's iceberg"). If Facebook failed at the handset level, they want to be in the loop for future standards.

So their PR provided another picture, less appealing to the great( outdoor)er audience, but more relevant for the core target of developers, who must hop in, chime in, and make this platform the winning proposition for MNOs across the world...

... particularly the ones in developping nations with booming consumer bases and huge coverage issues.

mot-bile 2016

DeepMind Your Language

In Wired's special on "The End of Code", Jason Tanz heralds the end of human programmers ("Soon We Won’t Program Computers. We’ll Train Them Like Dogs").

It's not just that artificial intelligence will be better at coding than humans (what could you expect from the control of the most basic - pun half intended - of all languages?): machines have already started to create their own languages, and Tanz mentions the very 'black box' I feared we should never allow to blossom in my focus on singularity "I'm with stupid".

We're not talking generational gaps, like these teenage codes and languages parents can't decrypt.

We have already surrendered as a species, given up the most elementary level of monitoring. And even if we started training sniffing dogs to spot rogue dogs, we would end up chasing a tail only us would believe to be our own.




mot-bile 2016

Networks: the TIP of Facebook's iceberg

Earlier this year, Facebook gave us a TIP (Telecom Infra Project*) about what could come next for them at the infrastructure level. Most members of the project, starting with Intel, Nokia, SK Telecom, Deutsche Telekom, are also on board of Facebook's much wider Open Compute Project, which also claims top coopetitor Google.

Naturally, Menlo Park wants a front seat for next gen network premieres - typically, early bird SKT is expected to be the first on 5G. But recent announcements*** at the F8 days confirm that the company intends to reach deeper into the value chain to secure and strenghten its leadership, particularly where innovation in network performance can prevent bottlenecks in these pervasive big data / heavy content times.

Terragraph (WiGig WiFi on 60 GHz) proposes ultra efficient W-LAN coverage for dense urban areas. You only need a station every 200 to 250 m. Of course it doesn't provide seamless handover, but a 200 m radius allows you more mobility than your typical hotspot.

Project ARIES (Antenna Radio Integration for Efficiency in Spectrum - MIMO) is more into W-WAN for rural areas. It combines 96 antennas to manage 24 simultaneous data streams, and aims at over 100 bps / Hz compared to 71 in early trials.

Here too, for a fraction of the price of a standard infra...
 
Could Facebook become a non-2-to-5G MNO, or a player in the game of standards? Not so fast. But an even more competitive value aggregator, certainly.

mot-bile 2016

* telecominfraproject.com
** opencompute.org 
*** "Introducing Facebook's new terrestrial connectivity systems — Terragraph and Project ARIES" (Facebook 20160414) 

And Then There Were Three - Beyond Iliad's Odyssey

L'Express reported* that Xavier Niel (Iliad / Free) met with EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, officially to check which crumbs could fall on his lap following the O2-3UK merger.

They probably talked a lot about another 4-to-3-player story, the purchase of Bouygues Telecom by Orange, which was collapsing at that very moment. Martin Bouygues precisely blamed Niel and Free for demanding too big a share of the Bouygtel pie expected to be splitted among Orange, Free, and SFR**.

Note that L'Express happens to belong to Altice and Patrick Drahi, who happens to own SFR, and, reportedly, to hate Niel's considerable guts ever since he took Michael Boukobza back from him. Note also that Drahi is making the news in both senses of the expression: his name appears in the Panama Papers, and that's unlikely to quiet the jitters about his burgeoning EUR 50 bn debt (for instance, to remain UK-wise, Drahi's Numericable paid a fortune to get the Premiere League rights for France, beating both Canal+ and BeIN Sport).

Now beyond Niel, Drahi, and Bouygues, who's France's key fourth player? France Telecom's Stephane Richard's not much of a divisive character.

Without naming names, Martin Bouygues mentions troubling positions from the government, and I wouldn't be surprised if there were conflict of interests between President Francois Hollande, who wants to run again in 2017, and his Minister Emmanuel Macron, who also nurtures plans for the presidential elections. 

There was a lot to gain politically from the new deal in the French mobile market, particularly since it involves key players in the media: Drahi bought L'Express-Roularta and BFMTV, Niel owns Le Monde, and Bouygues TF1 and LCI. And let's not forget Vincent Bollore: if his Vivendi sold SFR to Altice, he still calls most of the shots, and this time, he might not bet everything on Sarkozy...


mot-bile 2016

* "Angleterre: Xavier Niel a rencontré la commissaire européenne à la concurrence" (L'Express - 20160401)
** "Martin Bouygues : «Pourquoi je n'ai pas vendu Bouygues Telecom à Orange»" (Le Figaro - 20160403)

"Fourth Industrial Revolution" passed Go, but singularity not yet a stone's throw away

Fun to hear the "Fourth Industrial Revolution" buzz at the WEF in Davos: years after Germany coined the corny "Industry 4.0", we're still applying XIXth century terms to XXIst century issues.

In a revolution, the old order is toppled by a new one. But in the previous 3, humans were in charge. So we're not just talking industries when we're talking 'bout a revolution, as Chapman sung (Tracy, not David).
What matters is that, in case you missed Elon Musk's howls of outrage weeks ago, worries about singularity are really getting mainstream. They're making headlines every day and Google's AlphaGo defeating a Go master* just confirmed the impression that our irrelevance is only a stone's throw away.


Impressive, but AlphaGo succeeded by studiously analyzing every move made by said master in his previous games. Here's a quick learner, but not yet a fully disruptive mind. Even go is finite, after all. We have yet to see A.I. set really new rules, invent really new games.

And get really silly.

Until then, as always, "I'm with stupid".

mot-bile 2016

* see "AlphaGo: using machine learning to master the ancient game of Go" (Google Blog 20160127)

Do Seamless 5G Communications Start With Flawless 5G PR?

Last March, NTT DoCoMo, KT, and China Mobile announced technical collaboration on 5G, each one with an Olympic event in mind: Pyeongchang 2018 for Korea, Tokyo 2020 for Japan, Beijing 2022 for China.

China Mobile, who started 5G development 5 years after DoCoMo, is clearly the laggard here. But by its sole presence, the World's biggest operator already brings considerable leverage for the standardization as well as for the ramp up phases, securing the full involvement of an ever progressing Huawei*.

NTT DoCoMo just presented at the Yokosuka Research Park the results of its recent trials**:
- on October 13 with Nokia Networks (2 Gbps transmission on 70 GHz, in Roppongi Hills, with the help of "two new technologies: beamforming, which focuses radio waves in a specific direction, and beam tracking to control beam direction according to the mobile device's location" - beamform me up, Scottie!),
- on October 26 with Fujitsu (multi-BS, multi-device 11 Gbps on 4.6GHz),
- on November 12 with Samsung (2.5 Gbps reception on 28 GHz, in a moving vehicle in Suwon),
- on November 18 with Huawei (MU-MIMO transmission of 43.9bps/Hz/cell, outdoor in Beijing), and
- on November 19 with Ericsson (MIMO 10 Gbps reception on 15 GHz).

A concise and impressive display, and a nice PR operation for a leader willing to show it covers all the bases. I'm curious to see how KT follows. In a nation already 70% converted to 4G LTE, Korea's #2 mobile operator has been the most vocal about 5G, and even about 4.5G following the launch of GiGA LTE last June. The names of Samsung, Ericsson-LG, Alcatel-Lucent and Huawei have been announced for collaborations at the new 5G Research and Development Center (in Umyeon-dong, Seocho-gu, Seoul), and such technos as MIMO, Millimeter Wave, 3D beamforming have already been tested, like multipoint transmission in a moving car (with Ericsson last May, Distributed MIMO, 2 Gbps).

KT also demonstrated 'core technologies' for 5G (5G drone, 5G hyper-virtual reality, 3D hologram), which got a few Korean media confused between 5G-friendly services and 5G 'networks'***.

GiGA LTE or 5G? "Drone Ski Jumping with 5G Network" feeds the confusion

That's one of the differences between DoCoMo's 'engineer/product/provider' PR and KT's 'marketer/service/user' PR. 

We already saw how the pedagogy of 2.5G, 3G, or 4G worked, and we already know that quantum leaps at the operator's level can seem mere upgrades at the user's level. Let's not fret over hair-splitting debates between 'post-4G', 4.5G and 'pre-5G'.

mot-bile2015

* ZTE focuses on 4.5G ("pre-5G" deal with SoftBank)
** "DOCOMO Successfully Conducts 5G Trials in Actual-use Environments - Trials carried out with Nokia Networks, Samsung, Ericsson, Fujitsu and Huawei" (NTT DoCoMo 20151126) - see also "DOCOMO 5G White Paper" (NTT DoCoMo 201407)
*** e.g. "KT demonstrates 5G network at National Assembly" (Korea Times 20150902)

Mi Mobile on MIUI - Mi IoT on Your Network

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has awarded over 40 MVNO licenses since 2013. Among the recipients, many service providers (e.g. telcos like YuanTel, Snail Mobile, or specialists like Hainan Airlines, Ping An Insurance, CMBC bank, or Youku Tudou - video sharing), retailers (from the big netcos like Alibaba - who launched 'Qinxin' last Summer - or JD.com, to mobile phone retailers like D.Phone or FunTalk, to mobile service retailers like AiSiDi or Telling, to home appliance retailers like Suning or Gome),  manufacturers (e.g. Lenovo, Hisense, Foxconn, or Xiaomi)...

As of August 2015, 26 of the licensees had launched their services, claiming over 10 million subscribers (up from 8.2 the previous month), including 1 for YuanTel. 9 M subs were on China Unicom, 1 M on China Telecom, 0.1 M on China Mobile, which was just starting in the game... and boasts about 820 M subs.

Xiaomi, who sold 60 M smartphones last year, launched "Mi Mobile" last week on China Telecom and China Unicom networks. Surprisingly for a manufacturer, they offer SIM-only services. This company is used to making little margin on each handset, but also to leveraging its customer base through peripherals and convergent service platforms, particularly around its MIUI platform on Android. 

Among the gizmos found on Mi.com: Mi Pad, Mi Box, Mi TV, Redmi Note, Mi Band, Mi Power Bank, and even Mi Air Purifier:

If Mi Mobile is more the Airpocalypse-fighter than the airtime-killer kind of MVNO, MNOs and fellow manufacturers must beware: even before becoming an operator, Xiaomi had the IoT-ready approach players like Samsung lack. And they have a better focus and drive than local rivals Hisense or Foxconn...

mot-bile 2015

Alphabet Inc. or Google Offshore? Driving Investors MAD

So Google opened its books as Page wrote a letter announcing Alphabet.

"G is for Google"
G is for acceleration
G is for the G-spot of investors
G is for gee!

But wait. Is that an Easter Egg on Alphabet Inc.'s website (abc.xyz)? Does Larry Page plan to drive investors MAD?

Why Alphabet? Of course there's the Standard Oil of the Internet syndrome, the urgent need for transparency ahead of big decisions from European regulators (not to mention the need for creative ways of securing massive offshore war chests), Page's love for the Berkshire model (as if Larry and Sergey were about to move into Warren Buffet's house in Omaha), or why not Page's quest of eternal life (in the beginning was the Alphabet?)...  

Anyway, Google seems to be gaining agility at the financial level (from a conglomerate to a holding company), but it it true at the operational level? Yes if you consider for instance partnerships of equals with third parties, or internal / external coopetitivity. Not so much if you consider the implications of transparency. Beyond what each unit earns, transfers between units will have to be measured in terms of money and resources. Even if subsidiaries are allowed to use the Ferrari engine for free like any other partner team, how about these in-house engineers who did all the fine tuning at critical entry points, sharing all key knowledge across the organization? Is core business at risk of becoming less fast, more furious? Let's see how this Service Pack (Sundar Pichai) performs.

Will Alphabet remain Google? Now I see a classic net company from the late 90s, maybe even a VC surfing the bubble with its core cashcow and a decent portfolio featuring potential great spinoffs, managing risk with different levels of priority, ready to dump activities as quickly as it ventures into new ones...

What matters is not whether ABC/G sells for USD 700 a share. 

Time matters. Time is of the essence.

And I'm afraid time is more likely to become a luxury in Alphabet City.

Not just because the Founding Father of The Great Foundation may not be as eternal as he wishes he were.

mot-bile 2015