Participants on a panel Tuesday at GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, included, from left to right: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvu, AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph de la Vega, Wall Street Journal columnist Walt Mossberg.
(Credit: Marguerite Reardon, CNET Networks)BARCELONA, Spain--iPhone maker Apple isn't at GSMA Mobile World Congress 2009 along with the rest of the mobile phone industry, but the company's growing success is definitely top of mind for key executives in the mobile market.
The iPhone and Apple's successful App Store got more than a passing mention on Tuesday during a panel moderated by The Wall Street Journal technology columnist Walt Mossberg.
The panel which included three of the most powerful CEOs in the mobile industry--Ralph de la Vega, CEO of AT&T Mobility, the second largest mobile operator in the U.S.; Olli-Pekka Kallasvu, CEO of Nokia, the world's largest handset maker, and Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, the worldwide software leader--centered on the need for more openness to spur successful innovation in the mobile market.
But the discussion quickly devolved into the need for openness, despite the growing success of Apple, considered the most closed player in the industry.
Each executive had his own idea of what openness means and how if Apple adopted its own vision of openness it could be more successful. De la Vega and Kallasvu said fewer operating systems are needed so that developers can create applications that run on more devices.
"Customers want us to simplify," de la Vega said. "Our corporate customers, especially, want a smaller set of operating systems to manage."
De la Vega, whose company is the exclusive operator offering the iPhone in the U.S., even said that more openness could benefit Apple.
"The iPhone is a great success, but it would be even better if the applications were interoperable," he said.
Kallasvu agreed. And he used Apple and its "closed" ecosystem as an example of what could limit innovation in the mobile market in the future. He said Apple's vertically integrated model, where its hardware and software are tightly controlled by the company, further fragmented the market. And he added that what is truly needed is more openness in developing applications.
Ballmer argued that device openness was important to give customers more choices. And he pointed to the number of choices that Windows Mobile customers have when choosing a device.
"I agree that no single company can create all the hardware and software," he said. "Openness is central because it's the foundation of choice."
Even though each of these executives argued for openness and took jabs at Apple for its lack of openness, Mossberg pointed to the company's growing success in the market. The iPhone, which was launched a year and a half ago, has seen tremendous growth in terms of shipments. And so has its newly launched application store. Apple said last month that there are a total of 15,000 applications available through the App Store. And the number of downloads has hit more than 500 million in just over six months.
All the talk of Apple and its success annoyed at least one European audience member who asked Mossberg and the other panelists why they were so worried about what Apple was doing when Apple's total worldwide market share is still miniscule.
De la Vega answered with a response that seems to sum up how the industry views Apple: "Because the other 99.5 percent of the industry is trying to copy the iPhone."
Indeed, they are. Even two of the companies on the panel have copied aspects of Apple's playbook. Nokia recently introduced its first touchscreen phone to rival the iPhone, the N97, in December. And Microsoft's new Windows Mobile 6.5 allows touchscreen navigation that looks eerily similar to the iPhone's software. What's more, Microsoft and Nokia clearly think that Apple is on to something with its App Store, since each company announced its own version of an application marketplace here this week.
Niklas Savander, executive vice president of services and software for Nokia, talks about the new Ovi application store at a press conference in Barcelona.
(Credit: Marguerite Reardon CNET News/CBS Interactive)BARCELONA--Nokia is taking on smartphone rival Apple with its own version of an application store.
On Monday, the world's largest cell phone maker, which has been losing market share at the high end to devices like Apple's iPhone, announced here at the GSMA Mobile World Congress 2009 that it will follow Apple and a few other handset makers in launching a virtual storefront where developers can upload applications and consumers can easily download them.
The news of Nokia's Ovi Store is hardly a shock. Several news agencies had reported that the company was expected to announce the store here at MWC.
Nokia said at the press conference that the store will be open for business starting in May. Nokia's flagship smartphone, the N97, will be the first Nokia device to have the application store software pre-integrated. The N97, which was announced in December, goes on sale in June.
The company added that other Nokia phone users, including those using S40 and S60 phones, will be able to download the application storefront starting in May.
Developers, who will get a 70 percent cut of revenue from the store, will be able to start loading applications to the Ovi.com Web site starting in March. Several content owners have already started working on applications for the store, including AccuWeather, Facebook, Rough Guides, Lonely Planet, Electronic Arts, Fox Mobile, and MySpace.
Nokia says it will eventually make the application store available to all of its Nokia phones, and it will begin rolling it out globally in the fall.
Nokia's announcement follows the big success of Apple's App Store, which provides applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Other smartphone makers have also jumped on the bandwagon with their own application stores. Google launched one for its Android phones and Research In Motion plans to have one up and running for its BlackBerry devices. Microsoft, maker of the Windows Mobile operating system, is also expected to announce its application "bazaar" at Mobile World Congress this week, too.
But Niklas Savander, executive vice president of services and software for Nokia, said at a press conference here Monday that the Ovi application store is different from the others.
"This is not just a place to find applications," he said. "It's a smart store. That is not just for smartphones. It actually suggests things you might like and adds social location dynamics to show you relevant applications. And it shows you what your friends have bought. And it changes the inventory based on where you are."
For one, the store is not limited to providing applications for smartphones. Eventually, all Nokia devices will be able to access some applications from the store.
"It's not only about smartphones anymore," he said. "We must address the range of devices we have in the market from the high end to the low end. This is not necessarily about getting the 2 percent of mobile users who are already using applications to switch. But it's about addressing the 98 percent that will soon start using applications."
More importantly, Savander said Nokia plans to provide a more relevant and contextualized experience through its store than its competitors have done. For example, Nokia will use GPS technology built into phones to provide location relevant content.
The store will also track applications that users are downloading and it will be intelligent enough to suggest other applications that might be of interest. And finally, it will also provide relevant applications based on what friends have downloaded.
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