SAN DIEGO—The theme of this year’s BREW conference is “Zoom Out.” That was evident from the performers singing on stage as well as dancing in the aisles before the opening keynote yesterday to the announcements Qualcomm made about its new strategies.
Qualcomm has taken its share of knocks for harboring a closed community, and often by extension (or not), so has Verizon Wireless, its biggest U.S. BREW carrier. But while Verizon is independently taking steps toward an Open Development Initiative, vendor Qualcomm is doing its share to address the surge for openness as well.
One Qualcomm executive explained that how the company operates is not that much different from the way Apple conducts business, which many interpret as a semi-open/closed system. Qualcomm wants to retain some control – after all, what good are all the backend systems without security? Yet, it wants to open up the ecosystem to more developers. At the same time, it has to protect developers so they get their proper share of revenue at the end of the day. How many people want to spend time and money developing an application that’s so open they don’t get any return?
The debate over openness will no doubt continue, but in public statements throughout the BREW event, Qualcomm executives referred to openness and the entrance of Webcos in the wireless ecosystem. Qualcomm pointed out initiatives that demonstrate the company’s support of openness, such as through its involvement in Gobi, the Skype phone and even MediaFLO.
As for opening up the BREW platform to new markets, Qualcomm’s support of Adobe Systems’ Flash technology, which developers can use to create richer applications for mobile devices, goes a long way toward reaching a much wider development community.
Qualcomm also unveiled Plaza, a platform-agnostic wireless Internet service that provides a common framework for widgets. Plaza will give publishers, developers and operators the ability to “open up the mobile Internet” to subscribers and monetize it for operators and content providers alike, according to Andrew Gilbert, executive vice president and president of Qualcomm Internet Services, MediaFLO Technologies and Qualcomm Europe, in a statement.
“Plaza is designed such that mobile widgets can come from a number of sources, including operators, Web companies and leading brands, who all share the ultimate goal of driving subscriber adoption of the mobile Internet,” he stated. “We believe that providing end-users with an easy way to extend their online lives to their mobile devices will help drive the uptake of data services.”
While Qualcomm continues with its business of chipsets, licensing and royalties, it also is making a renewed push into the services business, with Len Lauer, former Sprint PCS CEO, heading up that division since January. That includes the evolution of initiatives such as financial services through its Firethorn acquisition and the MediaFLO mobile TV service.
Separately, Universal Music Group (UMG) announced it will expand its lineup of direct-to-consumer mobile content and services by leveraging Qualcomm's BrandXtend solution. UMG's mobile offering will be available directly to consumers through its artist Web and WAP sites, CD packaging and its GetMusic.com portal.
Last year, Qualcomm announced Major League Baseball as a BrandXtend customer.