The most accurate predictive letter in computing and telecommunications,
read by industry leaders worldwide.

 

 

 

In This Issue     Feature: Democratizing Computing   Smartphone: Personal, Affordable, and Accessible The Next Innovation Wave The Cellphone As a Platform in Healthcare Plug-and-Play Accessories Industry Landscape The Democratization of Computing About Sailesh Chutani   Upcoming SNS Events & Media Links   In Other House News…     SNS Positions Open How to Subscribe May I Share This Newsletter? About SNS About the Publisher Where’s Mark?

By Sailesh Chutani

 

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New Heads and Hands: I am looking for a new Executive Assistant, and for a person or program to sell SNS site licenses to global corporations; details on both are in the “In Other House News” section of this letter.

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Save the Date – the Second Annual FiReGlobal : West Coast conference will be held on November 11th, at the Fairmont Olympic Hotel, in Seattle. You can register early at Preferred Member rates here:

 

www.futureinreview.com

 

 

[We are currently seeking FiReStar companies for FiReGlobal : West Coast – companies that are making a positive impact on the world, and which need and deserve notice. Please contact Sharon Anderson-Morris at sam@stratnews.com if you wish to nominate your, or another, company.]

 

“You are really doing a great service to the world by showcasing such a variety of frontier ideas, and you seem to take some chances, which is also great to see. I’ve given talks and attended annual SoCal, TED, and Renaissance meetings, and yours creates the best atmosphere for an exchange of ideas in a professional yet easygoing atmosphere.” – James Fallon, Chief Scientific Officer, NeuroRepair Inc., a selected FiReStarter 2010 company.

 

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Publisher’s Note: Our members have watched the industry strategic energies move over time from fewer users of more powerful machines, to a global base of users of many types of less-expensive computing and communications devices. It is almost fair to wonder about the cart and the horse: do cellphones improve the economics of emerging poor, or do those moving from poverty to basic, consumer-level incomes buy more technology? The answer to both is a clear “Yes.”

 

Just as the wildfire-like adaptation of spreadsheets changed corporate power structures forever (and reduced a couple of management layers), so today do we see technology flattening the power structures, politically and economically, worldwide. As most nations move from a Push societal structure to a Pull structure (unless you live in a communist or Islamist country), this bottoms-up, on-demand participation profile will create lasting change. These changes are already evident in income, in culture, in politics, in attitude, and in healthcare. Central to all of these, in developed and emerging nations, is the cellphone. And, although “smartphones” (with full-on computing power) remain currently stuck in the wealthier demographics, I have never considered unit or retail price a barrier in the technology world. Rather, it’s just a small pause.

 

Sailesh Chutani is a brilliant entrepreneur who is in the middle of these changes, and I can’t think of anyone better-suited to describe them. Luckily, he agreed to share his views with our members. – mra.

 

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» Democratizing Computing:

          Cellphones As the New Computing Platform

 

By Sailesh Chutani

 

 

Personal computers democratized computing by pushing it out of data centers and into offices and homes. They created a new ecosystem and generated a tremendous amount of wealth for the dominant players in that ecosystem, Microsoft and Intel being among the most well-known. But they still left billions of potential users untouched, because they were too expensive, or too complicated, or both.