MONTEREY, Calif.-Ending months of speculation and veiled tension, Microsoft Corp. last week officially announced it joined the Wireless Application Protocol Forum, a move many see as effectively ending a microbrowser war in the making.
The announcement spurred a collective sigh of relief among industry players holding their breath since the software giant first announced its intention to create a microbrowser that could filter Internet-based content to wireless phones based on existing standards.
The WAP Forum was created with much the same purpose in mind, except it touted a new standard called Wireless Markup Language as the means for doing so, which Microsoft at first rejected.
Many see a time when all wireless phones will be manufactured with Web browsers included, and few wanted a standards war that would pit Microsoft, backed by the software developer industry, against the WAP Forum, backed by wireless industry players. Those involved say such a war would stifle innovation and slow adoption.
Microsoft’s endorsement of the WAP Forum’s efforts means application developers can write software to one common standard, which many expect will kick-start the innovation needed to drive the smart-phone market.
Cindy Dahm, chairwoman of the WAP Forum Developer Group and director of business alliances for Phone.com, said the most immediate effect of Microsoft’s addition will be the number of developers brought to the effort, the current measuring stick by which the wireless data industry is judged.
“Microsoft has a rather large developer community,” she said. “With Microsoft validating the WAP Forum, developers can safely invest in the WAP platform.
“If we can set aside our differences and agree on a basic application like the microbrowser, then the entire pie can grow much faster because everyone has one place to start,” she continued. “We can innovate around one platform and compete later.”
WAP Forum members assured that Microsoft’s participation would be an active one and not merely observatory. Few, including the WAP Forum itself, see Microsoft’s announcement as the company granting the organization a compliment by gracing it with its presence. Instead, it is seen as a victory for the WAP Forum, which succeeded in gathering the support of some powerful wireless industry players so that Microsoft had no choice but to participate if it wanted to play in the wireless game.
“The WAP Forum really doesn’t need to be legitimized by Microsoft’s presence,” said Konstantin Zsigo, president of Zsigo Wireless Data Consultants Inc., which strives to attract application developers to the wireless data industry. “I think Microsoft is a little bit humbled here.”
The central issue is one of standards. WAP formed because there was no Internet standard to deliver Web content on wireless devices. Rather than wait for the Internet standards-setting body-the World Wide Web Consortium-to create one, the founding members of the forum set off to make their own.
Microsoft at first resisted the WAP Forum because WML is not a recognized Internet standard. The Internet standard to which all Web pages are written is Hypertext Markup Language and Extensible Markup Language. Content developers wishing to transmit information to wireless phones based on WAP would have to rewrite existing content with WML.
However, the ultimate goal of the WAP Forum is to have WML included in future Internet standards, to the point where all Internet content will include WML capabilities as well as HTML and XML.
The WAP Forum has been in negotiations with the W3C to do just that.
If all the wireless players accept WAP as their Internet delivery standard, then WAP, and with it WML, could become a defacto standard.
“What is a standard anyway?” asked Zsigo. “A standard is a group of people who agree to do things a certain way.”
Since its inception almost two years ago, the WAP Forum has grown to include 90 members, including most of the wireless industry’s biggest names.
“The new model of getting things done is doing it yourself,” Zsigo said. “And the more involved you are with it, the more control you have over it.”
“I think [Microsoft] recognized the strength of WAP once they tried to divert from it,” said Ben Linder, director of marketing at Phone.com and WAP Forum member. “I think the wireless industry is a very strong industry. It has some very powerful players. Microsoft had a difficult time getting into the cable industry without participating in it. In some ways, the very same thing happened here.”
It seems Microsoft has embraced a new strategy of inclusion and maybe has toned down the arrogance which has characterized it to date. Shortly following, and by far overshadowing the WAP Forum announcement, was Microsoft’s agreement to buy a $5 billion stake in AT&T Corp. With AT&T’s recent forays into the cable field, having closed its purchase of cable giant Tele-Communications Inc., Microsoft’s deal with AT&T gives Microsoft the ally needed to adopt its Windows CE set-top box software platform, which has been slow to accelerate.
Some speculation exists as to Microsoft’s intentions toward AT&T’s wireless interests as well. To date, AT&T has one of the few commercially available Web-phone services-the PocketNet.
“We believe Internet standards are key to the success of wireless data on browser-enabled phones,” said Harel Kodesh, vice president of the Productivity Appliances Division at Microsoft. “The WAP members have made significant progress in working with the W3C in establishing an Extensible Markup Language-complaint microbrowser solution that will enable the next generation of smart phones and handheld devices. We share that goal and look forward to working with the WAP Forum to jointly make wireless data and wireless products accessible and useful.”
“We are excited to have Microsoft join WAP,” said Chuck Parrish, chairman of the WAP Forum and executive vice president of Phone.com. “We believe that WAP’s efforts to ensure product interoperability and industry growth for wireless Internet will benefit significantly from Microsoft’s involvement. The fact that WAP Forum members represent industry leaders in handsets, software, carriers and data infrastructure providers ensures that customers have an increasingly broad range of standards-based wireless solutions to choose from.”
