HPCs seen wireless lightning rod

Electronic News, Dec 9, 1996 by Cynthia Bournellis

Las Vegas--The new HPCs (handheld personal computers) based on Microsoft's Windows CE operating system are expected to ignite the wireless communications industry.

And while they are not yet out of the gate, shipments of HPCs, according to a number of analysts, are expected to reach 1 million units by the end of next year. Furthermore, sales of HPCs will be driven even more by the user's ability to access wirelessly their own desktop PC, noted mobile computing analyst Andrew Seybold, who is also president and co-founder of the Personal Computer and Communications Association (PCCA).

The PCCA's concern over wireless capabilities of handheld computers should be no surprise since wireless companies have millions of dollars invested in mobile networks to transport wireless data. BellSouth Mobile Data, for instance, in Atlanta, has a substantial equity investment in Ram Mobile Data. BellSouth's VP of operations Jim Hobbs said he wants to work with OEMs of handheld devices and software developers to define more wireless specifications. He foresees sales of these products and services going to Internet service providers and resellers and OEMs, with the majority of revenues coming from Ram's reseller customers.

To ensure the long-term success of Windows CE devices--HPCs being the first products released at Comdex (EN, Nov. 25)--a special meeting took place during Comdex among PCCA members. The matter at hand: discuss the challenges and opportunities presented to the wireless data communications industry by the Windows CE operating system.

PCCA members generally agreed that the already high penetration of the Windows operating system will greatly influence the acceptance of HPCs and future devices based on Windows CE, despite the platform's current limited communications ability. For instance, the PC has to be left on for the HPC to synchronize data.

"We were called together (at Comdex) to determine the most effective way to allow HPCs and Windows CE to communicate with desktop computers," said Mr. Seybold.

Present, and much welcomed at the meeting, was Microsoft. And the big question for the software giant was, when will Microsoft be able to deliver remote synchronization demands in the Windows CE platform? (Windows CE does have built-in functionality for wireless connectivity only, for access to applications such as E-mail or the Internet.) "Our first cut was to provide the (wired) connection for synchronization," said Robert O'Hara, a software design engineer at Microsoft's Consumer Systems division. He added that his representing Microsoft at the meeting was a start toward nailing down a time when Windows CE will offer remote synchronization commands to desktop.

Ideally, what the PCCA would like to see is a device that is unobtrusive, can be carried around without much thought and is capable of giving the user all the information he or she wants, anytime and from any remote or wired location.

Part of the current problem is that instigation of the synchronization starts at the desktop. "(What we'd like) is to get the HPC to instigate the sychronization session," said Mr. Seybold.

Microsoft too wants to improve wireless communications. Even Mr. O'Hara expressed concern over the current communications capabilities of Windows CE. "These things will be pointless without wireless communications and will just end up in a drawer." Wireless synchronization didn't make it to the first cut of Windows CE simply because Microsoft needed to meet its delivery date. "We just didn't have time, that's all," said Mr. O'Hara. He said Microsoft will address synchronization commands to the desktop in the development of revision two of the OS.

With the success of Windows, OEMs of the new HPCs are confident they will sell lots of product, whether they want to or not. But the PCCA said OEMs will feel even more comfortable promoting these products and participating in the wireless world once more wireless standards are in place.

"Microsoft told us to tell them what needs to be done (in terms of standards), and then they will work with us to put the hooks in it," said Mr. Hobbs. The PCCA will join Microsoft before Christmas at its Redmond, Wash., campus to discuss further these issues.

While it appeared Mr. O'Hara was on the hot seat at the meeting, Mr. Hobbs made it clear that Windows CE is not the problem, but rather a starting place to move wireless forward on this software platform.

Windows CE will give the wireless industry critical mass to move ahead in horizontal markets, such as corporate, small business, individuals, small office/home office and value-added resellers (VARs). According to Mr. Seybold, VARs are considering the platform for implementing mobile computing applications with built-in wireless technology for accessing corporate data, while other VARs are looking at Windows CE devices as information terminals to be used to access data made available to fleets of users via corporate servers on both the Internet and intranets.

Other concerns raised at the meeting dealt with getting data to and from handheld devices via the desktop by way of corporate information systems departments regardless of whether it's done over plain old telephone lines, the Internet, ISDN, etc. And the PCCA wants to make sure that the pipe to the desktop is secure.