Apps software is key differentiator argues ZTE

Rating: Hardware differentiation is not sufficient handset vendor says
China s number one handset supplier, ZTE , argues that in order to survive, the leading software vendors will be forced to develop their own handset software services. So ZTE intends to throw resources at software development in its plan to become a global Number Three supplier by 2015.

GoMo News was visiting Chinese handset manufacturer ZTE s mobile phone R&D facility based in Shanghai. This provided the chance to chat with Xiong Hui, vp for ZTE s handset division.

Mr Xiong said that in future, he sees all of the handset vendors core competitiveness as coming from software not hardware. Thus ZTE has already committed large resources, energy and effort into the software area.

To this end, the company has so far launched software research and development centres in Europe; North America; and China. This equates to more than 1,000 engineers being devoted to ZTE s own handset software development.

ZTE s current business model is to sell their products directly to the operators. Its objective is to listen to their needs and then to integrate self-developed software modules into products.

The company will also help its operator customers to tailor their own apps for their own handset purchasers. This is a very different approach from Nokia, Xiong says, which targets its products at global customers rather than a tight knit group of customers.

The first results of this software development should been seen by ZTE s operator customers in South America and Europe. ZTE insists it will modulise and platformise its products.

As the conversation progressed it became obvious that Xion was talking about handset software at the application layer not the OS layer. This is where he beleives that crucial software development will take place.

Sadly, GoMo News didn t get the chance to see how Xiong would compare ZTE s plans to the recent announcements (See GoMo News passim) that Samsung has made over its bada initiative.

Xiong Hui hinted that ZTE s future plans would include co-operation with other partners for software development.

Afterwards a ZTE spokesman couldn t say whether these intended partnerships would cover software apps but he did confirm that no such tie-up has been announced yet.

The company trotted out a whole bunch of stats aimed at proving that it is very quickly climbing the league table of handset vendors. Expanding sales 40 per cent when overall handset sales are in a decline globally is a bit of a clue.

Read Online for More Information