Letter Never Sent

Research in Motion (the company that makes the Blackberry) should stay on its toes. While I think there is room for multiple companies and I love the Blackberry, they need to keep innovating in order to compete in a market that now includes Apple’s iPhone and eventually some Google Android-based products. I hope every company who makes smartphones is losing sleep over the competition. That fear will drive innovation.

Both Apple and Google represent a new breed of competitor far different from Microsoft, Nokia, Palm, or any of the other incumbents in the field. They are companies with Vision and, more importantly, companies with the resources to realize their Vision. Everyone can dream up radical ideas and strategies, but few can execute them.

While Apple is making serious inroads with the iPhone, Google is the company everyone should worry about because they can touch everyone else without trying to get a slice of the same highly-contested pie. Leaving aside their Android project (a free smartphone OS), let’s look at what they do.

Even though the iPhone is closed to other third-party applications, Google provides native software for the iPhone (Google maps and a special YouTube-viewing application). They also provide downloadable apps for every other smartphone platform. On my Blackberry for example, I regularly use five different Google applications: the Google Maps for Mobile app with My Location (instead of Blackberry Maps or GPS), the Google Talk IM client, the Gmail app, Google Mobile Sync (which syncs the Blackberry Calendar and the Google Calendar. I use this now instead of Blackberry Enterprise Server and Microsoft Exchange, which has saved me $30 a month), and Google Mobile Updater (which checks for new versions of Google Software). This is not including the website I visit the most via the Blackberry web browser: Google Reader.

The truth is, Google improves my Blackberry experience. I don’t know if that should make Research in Motion or Apple nervous, but it is definitely significant.

Leaving aside any speculation on their plans for the 700 Mhz spectrum auction or the potential success of Android, it is not difficult to imagine that Google might eventually be the most important company in the smartphone universe by continuing to provide better and better tools to as many people as possible.

As you may know, I’m a smartphone enthusiast. I have owned a few Blackberries and have lusted after the iPhone every time I’m at the Apple store.

In reading the Google Maps for Mobile discussion groups, it’s apparent that people use many different types of smartphones, from Windows Mobile devices, to Blackberries, Nokias, and iPhones. As smartphones go even more mainstream, I don’t believe any one company will dominate in providing the devices. The technology and market will become more sophisticated, allowing more businesses and projects to flourish. Multiple hardware and software options will be available and a diverse ecosystem will emerge. That’s why I like Google’s approach. They are busy creating great software that can be used on the mobile web or through various applications developed for every platform. For example, Google has a version of Google Maps and YouTube developed especially for the iPhone. Similarly, they have created special downloadable versions of Google Maps and Gmail for the Blackberry. Everything they do for the handset manufacturers ties back in to their wonderful data services. They are the octopus sitting in the middle of everything busily collecting more data.

With the advent of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance, even more innovation should emerge, especially in the field of location-based services. The people working with Android™ have demoed some interesting location-based applications that show your friends where you are, or alert them when you are nearby. There are endless possibilities, especially when it comes to collecting location data, which is the big payoff for Google. I’ve noticed that in using Google Maps for Mobile version 2.01 that it keeps running even after you return to the home screen. Past versions without “My Location” did not do this. My guess is the map application stays running in the background in order to keep pushing data back to Google. Google says it uses the My Location data to improve the service and does not report back user information, but one could imagine other interesting uses such as traffic data, behavioral data (what stores do people go to), etc. It could then build a nice service based on this data. This could be used to fine tune their location-based advertising if tied to demographics. Advertisers would certainly like to know more about the habits of their most desirable customers and would love to have better ways to reach their audience.