HTC Smart - Worlds First BREW Mobile Platform (BMP) phone

HTC has launched the first BMP phone in the market. After being the first to bring Android into the market it has now launched the first BREW mobile platform mobile phone.

HTC is trying to diversify its business. Over the last few years it has been mainly focussing on Windows mobiles. However, now it seems to be interested in other mobile platforms and being the first in launching any platform always helps. HTC has already lauched quite a few android phones already and now the first BMP phone. BMP is the lastest version of BREW, a properitery of Qualcomm.

'Smart' as its called is aimed at the entry segment of the smart phones market.

Good features:

Multiple home screens

touch screen

Stylish

very similar to the android phone

Facebook

Messaging

Drawbacks:

Auto focus in camera is not there

No WiFi

No GPS

Since this is the first BMP phone on the market have to see how it fares. Android took about 2 years to pick up (since it was launched during the global slowdown) but now its seems to take up a huge market share. We are yet to see how BREW will fare in the market. BREW was mainly focussed on CDMA mobiles till now, however with the launch of BMP it seems to make an entry into the GSM, 3G market as well.

HTC smart didnt make news in the market since its launch and even the platform BMP seems to be going down with no new phones being launched even after a year since the launch of its first phone

Google Voice - A challenge to telecom companies???

Google Voice is all set to change the face of communication. This is a free service that uses VoIP calls to interconnect phone numbers.

Google Voice is a google's version of GrandCentral which was acquired by Google in 2007. “One phone number for all your phones, for life" is the basic idea behind GrandCentral. GrandCentral was launched in 2005 but once it was aquired by Google all its operations were suspended. It took a long time for google to relaunch it as Google Voice, ofcourse with a lot more features.

Google Voice was launched in March 2009, and as of now, its in the invite only mode and only introduced in USA. All the previous members of GrandCentral were given an account along with the users queued for Google Voice service.

Users of Google Voice are able to select a single phone number, from various area codes. When a Google Number is called, any phones set by the user will ring. The user can set a particular phone to ring based on the caller, time of the day etc. The user also has the option for voicemail, block calls, call forwarding etc.

Microsoft's OneApp a challenge to Google Android ???

After google, now Microsoft also made it way into the mobile market. Microsoft launched its new program for mobiles "OneApp". Intrestingly this is also based on Java just like Android but more specifically for emerging markets. ie. for feature phones.

Android didnt make a huge impact on the market. Need to see if OneApp makes any impact on the mobile market.

The OneApp Development Kit expected to hit the market at the end of the year 2009. Taking a dig at the android market OneApp maintains that there is no need to search for new apps in the web and download them. OneApp maintains a client server architecture wherein there is no need to download or install instead there is constant interaction with the client handset and the OneApp server.