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Wireless communications is the fastest growing area of the communications industry. Mobile phones have experienced vast growth over the last decade, and this growth continues worldwide. Wireless communications has become a critical business tool and part of everyday life, and has replaced wired systems in many developing countries.

Free spirits can now roam whenever the mood takes them, thanks to Wireless Internet (WiFi). The mobile Internet is finally here and mobile communications has changed the way we communicate. By removing the barriers of place, people worldwide have new and rewarding ways of connecting with others – both privately and for business. The possibility of anytime, anywhere communications brings choice and freedom. With almost 2 billion users in the next decade, mobile devices will be the main method of communication.

The next few years will see the further convergence of mobile communications and the Internet towards a shared architecture. This mobile Internet will not be simply the Internet of today accessed from a mobile device. Instead, we will be using custom applications and services profiled according to our personal preferences.

To stimulate innovation and enable contributions by many collaborators, a shared architecture based on open technologies and standards is necessary. This will result in innovative and interoperable services that benefit the mobile users, and business opportunities for innovative companies.

The mobile Internet vision assumes users will use different mobile devices for connecting to many different services, via various access networks. In practice, this means that users must be able to access their personalized services through mobile devices that best fit their needs and whereabouts. It encompasses universal and integrated instant person-to-person or person-to-business visual communications. This is a complete new media that will revolutionize the way we communicate.

Currently, with the launch of the first third generation (3G) phones, and the growth of Bluetooth-enabled mobile devices, it’s finally becoming possible for people to get the same online experience on the move as they do at home. More important than this, though, WiFi is becoming a cost-efficient way for users to create home entertainment networks, share bandwidth across communities, and get Internet access through their own mobile devices when travelling –all without having to seek out the nearest Internet café or public library.

WiFi has been championed by technical boffins over the last decade as a further means of democratising the Internet, and it’s finally emerged as the most exciting development in the online world since the launch of broadband in the late 1990s. It offers the potential to make high-speed Internet access ever-present, whether checking your email in the train station, the airport lounge, hotel room, hospital, university or Internet café, or getting wireless broadband access in the remote corners of the country, where ADSL and cable providers fear to tread. You connect to the WiFi network by using a wireless supplier’s Service Set Identifier (SSID) - Megabeam the name used to identify a network - and are then redirected to the company’s site to buy credits.

Both 3G and Bluetooth are corporate-driven, hugely marketed attempts to bring the power of the Internet to our mobile lifestyles: that’s partly because their entrepreneurs have the opportunity to reduce costs on expensive corporate communication networks.

It’s this kind of mobile lifestyle which is set to change people’s attitudes about when and where they get to go online. For British users, all too used to rationing their surfing time or risking high telephone bills, that can only be a good thing.

Mark Bower, Director

NextWave.IT Limited

www.nextwaveit.biz

enquiry@nextwaveit.biz