Smartbookblog.com is a new online forum for news, opinion, and the latest, most definitive information focusing on smartbooks – a new category of product that offers many of the best qualities of today’s smartphones, while providing smaller sizes and lower power consumption than either notebook or netbook computers. The smartbooks concept was introduced at the recent Computex show in Taiwan, where several prototype devices were demonstrated. And despite the challenges of the past year’s recession, end users, smartbook manufacturers, and even wireless operators are showing remarkable enthusiasm about moving to this new class of product. In fact, we think the argument for this market legitimacy already has been settled.
My name’s Loring Wirbel, and I’ll be overseeing writers and columns for this Qualcomm-sponsored blog, which we hope you will find both exciting and illuminating. I’ve covered the communication and computing market for publications and websites such as EE Times for 25 years. I’ve watched Qualcomm evolve during that time from a provider of modem technology for first-generation digital cellular phones, to a broad-based integrator of chipsets, services, and software for the new generation of smartphones that now command the lion’s share of the worldwide 3G/4G wireless markets. This year, Qualcomm is making its foray into a new market that is outside the core of its traditional focus on voice communications, and it’s exciting to be here at the starting gate to chronicle the development of this new vertical market from its infancy.
So who’s likely to dominate this category – PC manufacturers, gaming experts, smartphone veterans, or a mix of familiar names and unknown startups? How will most consumers buy a smartbook – through a wireless operator, directly from a large retail outlet like Best Buy, or through an online Amazon-like service? These are the kinds of questions we hope to debate in this forum. I emphasize the word “debate,” because one of the keys to keeping a blog dynamic is to encourage and maintain a lively dialog and interaction with its readers. Think we’ve identified an early trend? Think our analysis of a new application is ridiculous? Tell us! We’re looking forward to hearing your take on these topics, which just might hold a lot more weight than ours. In our next post, we’ll try to clarify what constitutes a smartbook, and what that definition means.
For more about this blog, and its contributors, check out the About Section. Meantime, stay tuned for much more, and let us know how we’re doing.
Loring
