Kevin Benedict Ponders the Future

HTML5 - What's New the Week of November 28, 2011

Adobe Drops Flash Player for Mobile Devices

This month Adobe announced that it will no longer develop the Flash Player for mobile devices. Wow! Steve Jobs said it was not a worthy technology for the iOS platform and that Apple would not support it. Now it goes away completely. Add another correct check mark for the late Steve Jobs.

Adobe did state it will release one final version of the Flash Player for Android and the BlackBerry Playbook.  Danny Winokur, Vice President and General Manager of Interactive Development at Adobe stated on the Adobe Flash Platform blog: “HTML5 is now universally supported on major mobile devices, in some cases exclusively. This makes HTML5 the best solution for creating and deploying content in the browser across mobile platforms.” He also indicated that “These changes will allow us to increase investment in HTML5 and innovate with Flash where it can have most impact for the industry, including advanced gaming and premium video.”

PC Magazine, in a November 10, 2011 article (Why Adobe is Deflating Flash: HTML5), states “Adobe's decision yesterday to stop development of its Flash Player for mobile devices and instead focus on creating tools for HTML5 seemed inevitable, given the near-universal support that HTML5 has garnered from the makers of mobile operating systems.”

Wedge Networks Announces Protection Against Security Threats in HTML5

Wedge Networks’ patented WedgeOS platform will support, protect, and mitigate against malware found in HTML5 specific content threats. According to the November 15, 2011 press release, “HTML5 provides a rich, responsive and standardized web application environment, enabling trends like mobile access and cloud-based applications. It is rapidly being adopted by organizations as web designers leverage the new protocols to create dynamic content to improve the overall end user experience."

Safer than previous versions, HTML5 however, does continue to have security challenges. To take advantage of the benefits of HTML5 while maintaining security, organizations require solutions that first support the protocol, then utilize techniques to understand and secure the content transferred through it. The WedgeOS platform from Wedge Networks is the first platform to support and secure HTML5 content and protocols.”

Read the complete press release here.

The Wall Street Journal on HTML5 

The Wall Street Journal published an article on HTML5 on November 11, 2011 titled “HTML5: A Look Behind the Technology Changing the Web”. The article’s author, Don Clark, states that according to binvisions.com, a blog that tracks Web technologies, 34% of the 100 most popular websites used HTML5 in the quarter ending in September. Mr. Clark goes on to say that despite the fact the HTML5 is missing some key features, the HTML5 excitement has spread, and many users won’t notice striking differences from websites that use Flash.  Also in the article, Dean Hachamovitch of Microsoft is quoted as saying “When you show people HTML5 applications, they say that doesn’t feel at all like a website.”

Read the complete article here.

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Kevin Benedict, Independent Mobile Industry Analyst, Consultant and SAP Mentor Volunteer

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Full Disclosure: I am an independent mobility analyst, consultant and blogger. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Commerce News Weekly - Week of November 28, 2011

The Mobile Commerce News Weekly is an online newsletter made up of the most interesting news, articles and links related to mobile payments, mobile money, e-wallets, mobile banking and mobile security that I run across each week. I am specifically targeting market size and market trend information.

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PayPal has announced that on November 24, the company saw a 538 percent increase in mobile payments compared to the same day last year. Read Original Content

Following its success in the United States, Starbucks is planning to install a payment system in its iPhone app for 700 of its stores in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Read Original Content

Pyxis Mobile provides an agile, powerful, and secure mobile enterprise application platform. It enables rapid cross-platform application development, unlimited data integration, enterprise-grade security, and the unique ability to change and update applications in real time. This newsletter is sponsored in part by Pyxis Mobile, http://pyxismobile.com/

The European Union is deciding whether to regulate mobile payments as NFC technology is driving the rapid advancement of paying through smartphones. Read Original Content

The Field Mobility News Weekly is an online newsletter made up of the most interesting news and articles related to field mobility that I run across each week. I am specifically targeting information that reflects market data and trends.

Also read M2M News Weekly
Also read Mobile Commerce News Weekly
Also read Mobile Marketing News Weekly
Also read Mobile Medical News Weekly
Also read Mobility News Weekly
Also read Mobility Charts Weekly

SAP and Sybase, a provider of enterprise and mobile software, have unveiled new mobile apps designed for a wide range of industries and mobile workers, from executives to knowledge and task workers. Read Original Content

The U.S. Army Logistics Innovation Agency is installing more than 6,500 active radio frequency identification tags as part of its Next Generation Wireless Communications program for logistics applications, to track military vehicles and other equipment as they are washed at Camp Arifjan, in Kuwait. Read Original Content

The U.S. Army is currently developing a tablet computer for battlefield use. The tablet is expected to use Android operating systems, and be smaller than Apple’s iPad with a ruggedized a protective case. Read Original Content

Since 1995, Syclo has enabled hundreds of companies in 37 countries and industries supercharge their businesses with mobility. This newsletter is sponsored in part by Syclo. http://www.syclo.com/.

In recent years rugged tablet computers have found practical uses in work settings that include dairy farms, beverage distributors, and auto-part companies as they find that tablet computers allow for more efficient business practices. Read Original Content

Motorola's RhoElements is this Strategy a Trend?

In October of 2011, Motorola Solutions (MSI), the segment of Motorola that split off to focus on business solutions, acquired RhoMobile. Rhomobile is a software company that develops mobile business and government solutions, and MEAPs (mobile enterprise application platforms). The day that Motorola announced this acquisition, they also announced a new solution from RhoMobile called RhoElements, a hybrid HTML5 platform for Windows Mobile, Windows CE and Android based Motorola devices.

This is an interesting strategy for a traditional manufacturer of Windows Mobile and Windows CE based barcode scanners, ruggedized smartphones, handheld and tablet computers. It appears that MSI is no longer willing to wait for Microsoft based OS answers and upgrade paths.

Over the past few years, Microsoft has severely damaged the ruggedized hardware market through neglect and a refusal to provide an upgrade path for their Windows Mobile and Windows CE mobile operating systems. This has forced the ruggedized hardware manufacturers to try to compete and sell expensive mobile hardware, with outdated operating systems, against a tsunami of innovative, inexpensive, new consumer-oriented smartphones and tablets. The ruggedized handheld manufacturers have seen their markets shrink as a result.

This Microsoft engineered disadvantage is motivating the manufacturers of industrial grade mobile devices to look for alternative solutions and upgrade paths. It appears that MSI has acquired theirs with RhoMobile. Rather than wait for Microsoft, MSI released RhoElement which appears to enable HTML5 based mobile applications to run on the old Windows CE and Windows Mobile browsers as this excerpt from DevProConnect states, "RhoElements is designed to allow businesses to quickly and cost-effectively develop and deploy web-based applications on existing Motorola Windows Embedded Handheld (formerly known as Windows Mobile) and Windows Embedded Compact (Win-CE) mobile computers as well as Motorola's recently announced ET1 Android-based enterprise tablet."

MSI bought a MEAP with RhoMobile that they hope to make a "universal" standard. RhoElement already supports Windows Mobile 6.5 and Android, and they have promised to soon support all of the other popular OSs.

Let's now take a closer look at some of the motivations that MSI has given for the acquisition of RhoMobile:

We (MSI and RhoMobile) have a shared focus on the enterprise with a strong commitment to partners.
MSI will provide the scale, resources, and industry knowledge to accelerate universal adoption of Rho technology.
MSI is strategically committed to the Rhomobile suite of products.
MSI is committed to supporting the Rhomobile community and continuing the open source heritage of Rhodes.

My analysis is that given the lack of answers and no Microsoft provided upgrade path, MSI is strategically changing paths. They have seen the negative impact on their business caused by a dependence on Microsoft and have sought and found a non-operating system dependent path to innovation which is a RhoElement, HTML5 hybrid approach to enterprise mobility solutions.

It will be very interesting to see if others like Intermec, PSION, Honeywell, Trimble and others also decide to acquire a non-Microsoft path.