Asia poised to take lead in wireless technology

Asia poised to take lead in wireless technology

SINGAPORE (AFP): Asia is well positioned to take the lead in the application of wireless Internet technology, having the highest number of mobile phone users worldwide, experts told a regional technology conference Tuesday.

Time will come when people in Asia will be able to point an infra-red equipped mobile phone at a soft-drink vending machine and the bill will be automatically charged to their bank account, they said at the Comdex Asia technology exhibition and conference.

Despite Asia having the highest number of mobile phone users globally, the potential beyond making calls or sending short messages has been largely untapped.

"When you look at the number of mobile users in Asia, it's far beyond anywhere else in the world," said Stefan Hanna, the Asia- Pacific vice president and general manager of Ericsson, Sweden's telecommunications equipment maker.

"It's growing like crazy, exploding," he told AFP after an executives' forum.

Wireless technology allows people to surf the Internet, transact business, pay for purchases, listen to music, watch movies and carry out a host of other functions using mobile phones.

While the U.S. leads in the usage of fixed lines and the Internet, it is lagging far behind Asia, especially Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Australia, Hong Kong and Singapore, in mobile phone usage, the conference was told.

Mobile phone use in these countries ranges from 47 to 61 percent of the population -- much higher than in the United States with only 39 percent.

"That clearly is leadership and by guarding that and spinning on that, I'm pretty sure that Asia has a fantastic opportunity to be the leaders when it comes to pushing new applications, new usage around this new technology," Hanna said.

In the next 15 years, mobile wireless applications will emerge into a much bigger business, compared with the business generated by the personal computer 20 years ago, he said.

The handphone will become a more powerful device than the personal computer from a consumer and business perspective, he added.

Steve Wood, the Asia-Pacific vice president for content networking at Nortel Networks, said the need to stay competitive in a globalised economy and the influence of cultural factors will drive Asia into the wireless Internet technology.

A penchant by Asians for face-to-face communication is also an incentive for investors, he said.

"The really big opportunity is mobile Internet," Wood told AFP.

"Furthermore, I think a lot of the Asian cultures really enjoy having personalized content delivery communication on them. In Asia a lot of the communication is face-to-face, one-on-one."

Although, infrastructure could be a hurdle as many Asian countries still lack the technology for wireless telecommunications, Wood said they will be forced to invest in the sector as a necessity for economic growth.

"Clearly the way it will unfold is wireless. In China and India, they can't dig holes in the ground fast enough to lay the cable to get the phone systems to get these people to make telephone calls," he said.

Regulatory issues on the auction of so-called third generation (3G) mobile licenses are also potential hurdles, Wood said.

"Regulatory issues, auctioning of the spectrum can be very sticky -- who controls what and what's the price," he said.

Another kink to be ironed out is how banks can work with telephone companies to encourage mobile wireless transactions, speakers said.

However, Kelvin Tan, director for mobile e-services at Hewlett Packard, cautioned against overhyping expectations.

"I think that it is important that we don't overhype. The expectations must be managed properly," he said.