Sierra Wireless said it has brought together 17 other companies in an alliance formed to work together to offer more complete solutions so the general public will adopt wireless data devices more quickly.
The WirelessReady Alliance is an invitation-only collaborative venture of hardware vendors, software developers, wireless service providers and network integrators.
Those joining must commit to certain obligations in writing concerning their commitment to develop needed parts of overall solutions as well as commit to work together with others in the alliance. There is a fee to join.
According to Andrew Harries, vice president of marketing at Sierra Wireless, the company initiated the alliance effort to help jump-start the fledgling wireless data industry, plagued by serious fragmentation and confusion of players, technologies and services.
“As everybody knows, it hasn’t been the year of wireless data in the past and won’t be any time soon,” he said. “There’s a lack of complete and compelling wireless data solutions.” Complete in that all the pieces are difficult to put together; compelling in that it’s hard to convince people to buy it, he said.
To date, wireless data successes have been limited to vertical market applications, Harries said, and even these customers conduct extensive cost-benefit analysis of the solutions before adopting them.
“We need to move beyond that,” he said. “We need to do what it takes to reach the mobile professional users for such discretionary activities as checking e-mail at the airport instead of waiting to get back to the desktop. You can’t do a cost-benefit analysis on that.”
He said mainstream computer manufacturers must adopt wireless data solutions for the industry to achieve mass-market acceptance. But such manufacturers are too confused to pick one wireless solution because of the many options available.
“The whole wireless data constellation is confusing. There’s too many operators, too many standards, too much hype … you need to sort out what’s real and what’s hype.”
Enter WirelessReady Alliance. The group first plans to analyze wireless data solutions to help companies separate the wheat from the chaff.
“We’ll be providing them with the analysis and information and with access to a broad range of different companies.”
Members will be able to submit product prototypes for compatibility testing with products made by other members, leading to pre-launch design validation.
“What we’re doing is putting together products that exist today or are in development in a way that makes total proven wireless data solutions.”
This lab testing and certification may one day include a WirelessReady certification logo on products. “The result is that tested, proven and well-conceived solutions reach customers earlier while vendors share the development investment, effort and risk with other members participating in the solution,” read a statement by Sierra Wireless.
The alliance also has a member-only Web site of wireless data news, analysis and background. The goal is to facilitate communication between members to support sales, marketing, technology and product activities by taking advantage of the expertise in the member base. Ultimately, this could lead to more concrete strategic partnerships and joint ventures between certain members.
Harries said Sierra Wireless pursued a “quality, not quantity” strategy in selecting alliance members. “In general, we’re interested in leaders in their particular markets,” he said.
Members in the hardware vendor category are electronic notebook and handheld computer manufacturers Compaq Corp., Hewlett Packard Co. and Sharp Electronics Corp.; consumer products manufacturer Casio Inc.; and industrial computing hardware firms Itronix Corp., Melard Technologies Inc. and Telxon Corp.
Software developer members are Cerulean Technology Inc., Data Broadcasting Corp., MDSI Mobile Data Solutions Inc., MobileForce Technologies Inc. and Nettech Systems Inc.
Wireless data service providers included in the alliance are AT&T Wireless Services Inc., Bell Atlantic Mobile and Wireless Telecom Inc. WirelessKnowledge, the joint venture of Microsoft Corp. and Qualcomm Inc., was named as an applications service provider, and Paradigm4 Inc. was included as a system integrator.
Harries said the alliance is looking to add several other members soon, and negotiations to do so are in progress. However, the listed companies constitute the founding members of the alliance.
“We have a critical mass of membership to get started,” he said.
