IBM
and Sun Are Working Without Wires
By
Nancy Gohring
11/07/2000 - Interactive Week from ZDWire
Copyright (c) 2000 ZD Inc. All Rights Reserved.
The aggressive pursuit of the wireless
market by computing powerhouses such as IBM and Sun Microsystems
signifies a change in the way telecommunications networks
are built, and could threaten companies that don't follow
that shift.
Instead
of using proprietary systems from small companies to deliver
features such as voice-mail or short messaging services,
operators and enterprises will soon have hardware and software
alternatives from IBM, Sun and other big manufacturers.
"Could
some of the small companies be displaced? Yes," said Judith
Hurwitz, president of consulting firm Hurwitz Group. Those
with very narrow focuses may be the first shoved out of
the space by the big companies, she believes.
Last
week, Sun introduced a wireless business unit, a $100 million
venture fund, and a software platform for wireless calendar
and messaging applications. IBM, for its part, introduced
software for wireless devices and a new wireless application
hosting service.
"The
shift in all communications networks will be toward general-purpose
hardware to perform functions that have previously been
performed by proprietary hardware," said Ben Linder, vice
president of marketing at Phone.com. Phone.com, for example,
offers a unified messaging solution that runs on Sun hardware.
Some traditional vendors, such as Avaya, are adapting to
this model. Avaya now offers Internet Protocol-based telephone
services to enterprises.
But
some of the smaller companies that have already made names
for themselves, such as GadgetSpace, MShift, Numoda,
ViAir and Wysdom, still think they have a lot to offer.
"I
think people as big as IBM have to look today to people
like us to find the creative, ingenious ways to solve business
problems," said Mary Schaheen, president and chief executive
of Numoda, which enables workers to pull data from the field
and deliver it back to the enterprise.
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