I think there're really 3 different (if related) applications here.
*Cordless phones in an office. Probably VoIP on 802.11b, but Bluetooth (when
you can get devices) is equally plausible. It's not too hard to stud the
area with $100 access points, 10 metres apart, plugged into fixed ethernet.
The more sophisticated variant is to let these handsets roam around the
campus (or multiple campuses). This can be done with fixed phones today (sit
at a desk, punch in a PIN).
*Tie this into the coporate mobile phone. I.E. have a second radio unit in
the mobile handset (and I believe all will have BT) and software that lets
it connect to the PBX. Incoming calls to the mobile or fixed numbers are
then routed to the PBX and over BT (or 802.11b) to the handset when you're
in the office, or to the cellular network and over a cellular airlink when
you're out of the office.
These seem completely plausible to me (though I can't see my company
deploying them, seeing as we use Lotus Notes!) The first seems a completely
generic, commodity product - the second is rather more sophisticated, and
really needs the active participation of the mobile operator (who would
probably be only too keen).
There's also another model - that outlined by Benjamin: divorce the 'number'
from the device and use a device independant interface to route calls to the
number to any given device.
This seems perfectly logical to me - it all makes sense in an engineering
sort of way that appeals to my inner geek. But that's also why I don't buy
it. It's too complicated to do. Sorry, I know that's a deeply subjective and
really unanswerable sort of argument, but the number of things that need to
be implemented, and the number of differnt parties that need to do it, seems
to me to be too great for such a model ever really to take off. I suppose if
we all has SIMs implanted in us, and The Matrix could track us anywhere and
route calls accordingly, it would be better, but as it is I don't buy it :)
As an illustration, one of Vodafone's integration effort's this year is the
Virtual Home Environment (VHE), which sounds horribly Orange, but actually
means that you can dial the same number to get voicemail etc on any
Vodafone-owned network. For me, that's completely redundant, 'cause I've
found out the international voicemail number and programmed it into my
phone. But what about the rest of the 269.47 million (June 2001, WestLB
Panmure;)) mobile subscribers in Europe. This is a great benefit for them!
Which tells us something, I think...
-Benedict Evans
-WestLB Panmure
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Received on Tue Aug 14 22:15:03 2001