VentureBeat

Updated

The Federal Communications Commission has approved the much anticipated Google Android phone, and documents suggest a release date of about Nov. 10 at the latest.

That’s because in the document, the manufacturer of the phone, HTC, requests the Commission grant it a short-term confidentiality request on its design attachments until Nov. 10th, 2008.

If Nov. 10 turns out to be Android-HTC release date, this is in the window of our recent prediction it would be released between Oct. 15 and Nov. 30.

Note the Nov. 10 date could be used to confuse people intentionally. The FCC request by Apple for the iPhone, for example, had a longer confidentially request than it really needed (three weeks in that case).

Engadget broke the news of the FCC approval. The FCC documentation makes it clear that the most exciting things about the phone may remain confidential until as late as Nov. 10.

Documentation is here from HTC regarding fact that it has authorization, and a WiFi interoperatibility certification is here.

It has already been widely reported that the phone is called the HTC Dream. In the documentation, the handset is listed as type: “Dream,’ and model: “DREA100.” There’s also mention of a “jogball,” which has been seen on the handset in videos that have circulated.

The attachments for which confidentiality is requested include 1) schematic design, 2) block diagram, 3) theory of operation and 4) BOM.

Here are the next steps in the Android process:
1) release of public SDK [Update: This final Android SDK release has just happened.]
2) ADC winner
3) announcement
4) release

[Update 2: Google just published a roadmap that looks rather similar to the one we outlined.]

Here’s the latest action:

Google phone details — Google’s Eric Schmidt had said Google wasn’t releasing a Google Phone, but the WSJ has the latest details about its significant action in the phone area nonetheless. Namely, it is working with other manufacturers.

Yahoo executive Daniel Rosensweig joins Quadrangle Group, a private equity firm — The former Yahoo operating chief will join the New York firm and help it on media, tech and communications investments. More here. Quadrangle’s investments include Cablevision Systems and movie-theater operator Cinemark.

Amazon is launching its own competitor to PayPal and Google Checkout — Techcrunch has details.

Discovery Communications buys green blog TreeHugger.com for a reported $10 million — TreeHugger makes announcement here. TreeHugger says it attracts 1.4 million unique users monthly. More at New York Post.

CBS Mobile is promiscuous with mobile ad companies — It has partnered with not one, but four mobile advertising companies: AdMob, Millennial Media, Rhythm NewMedia and Third Screen Media.

Google experiments with new behavioral targeted ads — If you perform a search for “Italian Hotels,” and then another search for “weather,” Google will show you ads next to your results related to the weather in Italy. Details at NewTeeVee.

Homepage company Netvibes criticizes Facebook for being closed — You can’t pull in the news feeds from your Facebook friends on to your homepage at Netvibes. Netvibes has introduced a widget to provide you information about your friends, but it is protesting the lack of the news feed.

New York Times suggests the Bancroft family was essentially bought off, when it agreed to sell Dow Jones/WSJ to Rupert Murdoch — Of course, it’s in the Times’ interest to make the parent of its competitor, WSJ, look dysfunctional, even if the structure will change under Murdoch. Reading a story like this, you begin to see why Dow Jones wasn’t performing very well.

Docstoc, a site where people can post any sort of document, reportedly about to raise cash — Docstoc is a competitor to Scribd, and is clearly trying to keep up. Scribd dubbed itself the “YouTube for documents” and raised $4 million in venture capital. Docstoc is rumored by Techcrunch to be about to raise money from co-founders of MySpace and angel investors in Baidu. We’ve asked the company for comment, but it hasn’t responded.

Yelp releases opens its platform to third-party developers — Yelp, the review site, has released an API that lets other sites or companies with mobile applications retrieve Yelp business and review data for integration into their own offerings.

The FCC set the wireless auction rules — The Mercury News has a good summary. Notably, Reed Hundt, a former FCC Chairman and executive with potential auction bidder Frontline Wireless, was originally a critic of the proposed rules. Now, he has responded by saying he supports the rules. We asked his representative why he has changed his tune. She said Hundt is now stressing the “glass half full” instead of “half empty.”

BitTorrent is rolling out free video service — Beginning next month, the San Francisco video and media distribution company will offer some of its library of television and feature films - which include titles such as “Letters from Iwo Jima” and “24″ — for free, supported by advertising. See Mercury News story here.

Updated

Google, seeking to extend Internet access to more people, which helps it make more money from its own services, made two big wireless announcements today.

It said it will bid at least $4.6 billion in an upcoming up-coming auction to operate a part of the wireless spectrum.

It also said it is leading a $25 million investment into a U.K company, Ubiquisys, which is developing hardware that lets cell phones run on home WiFi networks. In other words, it helps carriers move some of their data traffic away from their own cellular network, onto a home’s local area network, or the so-called “edge.” More on that in a second.

In explaining Google’s commitment for the wireless auction, Chris Sacca, head of Google’s wireless initiatives, complained that wireless spectrum for mobile phones and data is “controlled by a small group of companies, leaving consumers with very few service providers from which to choose.” The $4.6 billion, while it sounds a lot, may actually be low when compared to bids by others, he noted.

Last week, as the debate heated up around the FCC’s proposals about how to open up the 700 Mhz band of wireless, Google lobbied for the following points, all of which it said are necessary to shake up the staid wireless industry, bring choice to consumers, including lower prices:

* Open applications: consumers should be able to download and utilize any software applications, content, or services they desire;
* Open devices: consumers should be able to utilize their handheld communications device with whatever wireless network they prefer;
* Open services: third parties (resellers) should be able to acquire wireless services from a 700 MHz licensee on a wholesale basis, based on reasonably nondiscriminatory commercial terms; and
* Open networks: third parties (like Internet service providers) should be able to interconnect at any technically feasible point in a 700 MHz licensee’s wireless network.

As we understand it, at least, the third and fourth points above have not been guaranteed in the earliest drafts of proposals by the FCC on how to handle the spectrum being auctioned (See former FCC Chairman Reed Hundt’s column for VentureBeat earlier this week on this).

According to Sacca:

Why $4.6 billion? While we think that a robust and competitive auction based on these four principles will likely produce much higher bids, and we are eager to see a diverse set of bidders competing, $4.6 billion is the reserve price that FCC has proposed for the auction. With any concerns about revenue to the U.S. Treasury being satisfied, we hope the FCC can return its attention to adopting openness principles for the benefit of consumers.

Google’s backing of Ubiquisys, meanwhile, continues its efforts to support the extension of residential wireless access. Ubiquisys, based in Swindon, UK, makes so called femtocell access points for the residential market. Femtocell is a technology that will improve transmission of IPTV and high-bandwidth services. Wireless services would operate on local home networks, and be hooked up with the home’s land-lines or through VoIP using a home’s existing broadband connections. Carriers would sell the technology to consumers, pitching it as a way they can lower mobile subscription costs. According to a report from Dow Jones, Graham O’Keefe, a partner with Atlas, said the device sell for about $100-$150, and be brought to market in 2008. That’s a lot of money to ask consumers to fork out, though; its too early to know whether this will be compelling.

The investment is part of Ubiquisys’ second round of funding, the first being led by Accel Partners, Atlas Venture and Advent Venture Partners. The investors joined Google in this latest round.

According to the statement:

The Ubiquisys ZoneGate femtocell offers mobile users high-quality mobile coverage in the home using their usual 3G cell phones. The device plugs into an existing home broadband gateway or is built into a gateway product that includes WiFi, DSL, Ethernet, phone ports and USB.

‘Our mission is to empower mobile carriers to bring compelling service packages into homes using our ZoneGate solution,’ said Chris Gilbert, CEO Ubiquisys…In June 2007 ABI Research rated Ubiquisys number one femtocell vendor in a survey of the top ten players in the sector, based on product innovation and implementation.

The three-year-old company has now raised a total of $37 million.

updated

There’s a lot of excitement coming from a decision by the Federal Communications Commission chairman to propose rules that will set aside wireless spectrum for creation of an “open network” free from the chokehold of large telecom carriers.

The spectrum would be auctioned off early next year. Chairman Kevin Martin’s proposal will circulated as early as Tuesday.

This could provide an opening for other technology companies, notably Google, to make a major strike at the monopoly currently held by the carriers. See this story for the number of steps Google has already made to roll out its own network. Outwardly, Google has said it doesn’t want to become a full-fledged network, saying it isn’t part of its core activities. More on Google, and the challenges that remain to its bid, in a sec.

In covering the start-up world over the past several years, we’ve noted that one of the biggest bottlenecks to innovation has been the carriers’ control over the wireless industry. Start-up after start-up has complained about the large fees carriers charge any company hoping to offer services on their networks. The latest visible manifestation of the carriers’ power has been AT&T’s control of the iPhone.

The FCC move was anticipated, and we’ve been reporting the efforts of companies like Frontline Wireless to push it along. Technology entrepreneurs and investors have also written columns for VentureBeat in support of the opening. We also ran a column by investor Paul Grim today calling for T-Mobile, a network to boldly take action to open up its network as a way of challenging the bigger networks.

Google’s blog on the matter is here. Notably, Google has concluded that the carriers and cable companies will win the auction, because they will have so much to lose from it that they’ll pour huge resources to make sure others can’t compete. Here’s a Google lobby letter. And Reed Hundt, head of Frontline Wireless, has reportedly even called Martin’s proposal a “dreadful plan,” before it is even released, apparently believing there will be so many loopholes that carriers will dominate despite the “open” ruling (details at GigaOm).

The WSJ has more here.