We first reported last month when Sony Ericsson unveiled the Xperia X10 that it could be headed to AT&T or T-Mobile. Both carrier’s 3G bands were listed in the official product specifications, but we didn’t know which the phone would support when it landed in the United States.

Attempting to browse the FCC website gives any normal person a headache, but Engadget was able to spot the latest filing for the Xperia X10. Included in the documents was confirmation of support for UMTS HSPA Band 1, 4, and 8 (2100, 1700, 900). Operating band 4 (1700) is the frequency that T-Mobile uses for their current 3G network which further fuels the speculation we could see the device. Absent from the FCC documents were support for operating bands 2 and 5 (1900/850) which are the 3G frequencies for AT&T.

Continuing work with handset providers which are now pre-loading the NeoReader application

Mobile marketing is becoming an increasingly effective medium as advances in technology lead to more features on handsets.

This is the opinion expressed by MTV Networks New York's head of mobile marketing Sol Masch, who claimed that as a consequence, the channel is facing an exciting next 12 months.

"Given the enhanced capabilities of new smartphones on the market, we are now able to expand the ad products available to our advertisers on the mobile platform," he told industry news provider Mobile Marketer.

It appears that one believer in the effectiveness of the platform is the US Air Force, which teamed up with MTV and a mobile advertising company in a bid to boost recruitment among 16 to 24-year-olds.

This development comes after Clicky revealed that the most popular smartphone for mobile internet browsing in the US is the iPhone 3G. The device accounts for around 43 per cent of all mobile web usage.

What are your predictions for mobile marketing in 2010?

ATLANTA/NEW YORK, October 20, 2009 – Today NeoMedia Technologies, Inc. (OTC BB: NEOM), and Scanbuy, Inc., leaders in mobile barcode technology, announced they have settled all pending litigation between the companies and have granted non-exclusive patent licenses to each other.

NeoMedia and Scanbuy have agreed to terminate all pending litigation brought by NeoMedia against Scanbuy in 2004, and by Scanbuy and Marshall Feature Recognition, LLC (“MFR”) against NeoMedia in 2008.

In addition, NeoMedia has granted Scanbuy a royalty bearing, non-exclusive license to a portion of its patent portfolio in the U.S. In turn, Scanbuy has granted NeoMedia a fully paid, irrevocable, non-exclusive license of Scanbuy patents and a fully paid, non-exclusive sublicense to all of the patents licensed by MFR to Scanbuy within the U.S.

This agreement will enable consumer brands, advertising agencies and mobile operators to confidently engage with either company to implement mobile barcode solutions in the U.S. The technology has enormous potential to become a viable and widely adopted communication channel.

“The agreement between NeoMedia and Scanbuy removes the final roadblock to rapid commercialization of mobile barcodes in the US,” commented Iain McCready, Chief Executive Officer of NeoMedia. “We are literally dropping the green flag for brands, retailers and mobile operators to join the race towards mobile barcodes becoming a fixture in every consumer’s daily routine.”

”We are pleased that Scanbuy has reached a fair agreement with NeoMedia, and look forward to working with our partners to build a vibrant business in the United States,” said Jonathan Bulkeley, Chief Executive Officer of Scanbuy. “Both companies have invested a great deal in our intellectual property and we will continue to bring these solutions to leading marketers, wireless operators, and handset manufacturers around the world.”

The key findings of the GSMA White Paper are:
? There is significant interest in 2D Barcodes technology in different markets around the world
? 2D Barcodes can be used in a direct or indirect mode. The indirect mode enables new business models as it relies on a network server to resolve the identifier and can enrich the information associated to the end user in a secure manner
? While the direct mode provides an easily deployable solution, there are potential security risks, and an indirect mode solution would provide a safe, secure and trusted environment
? Under an indirect mode, regional and international interoperability is needed to ensure good customer experience. Ubiquitous service availability across networks is key to sustained market uptake
? Regional and international interoperability require an ecosystem managed by an authority entity that guarantees 2D Barcodes uniqueness
? The authority entity should be open, universal, trusted and affordable, and allow players to register a code under a fair use policy. It should also be an institutionalised sustainable process from a financial, commercial and quality perspective
? There is currently no standard for indirect mode and therefore there is a need for standardisation of all the elements and actors of the indirect mode, including the authority entity
? The actors found in a 2D Barcode ecosystem are: end users, technical entities (code readers, code management platforms), mobile network operators, authority entities and marketing entities (code sales agencies and code publishers)
? Code readers’ massive deployment is one of the key elements of the ecosystem to guarantee market uptake. Therefore code readers should be embedded in the phone "out of the box"
? Mobile network operators and other members of the 2D Barcode industry should support the definition of a 2D Barcode standard and the creation of an authority entity.

2D Barcodes are a success story in the Japanese market as a dominant mobile Internet enabler.

The technology supports two major operational modes, direct and/or indirect mode. In the case of the direct mode, the code is provided without any specific routing to the user. Therefore this mode supports existing business models.

Additional value can be added by creating a 2D Barcode service that can utilize the flexibility of a server side function that determines which service is invoked. This defines an indirect mode of using 2D Barcodes for service invocation and constitutes a service in itself, creating a role of a 2D Barcode service provider.

As a 2D Barcode has to be used through user interaction with their handset, the 2D Barcode service can support many benefit scenarios for mobile users and enable new business models:

? Location based services (not using network based location, e.g. triangulation)
? Profiling services
? Detailed usage statistics
? Assist promotion of operator-branded services
? Promote end-user loyalty for user-services (e.g. branded, bundled and relevant)
? Help build a back-end content provider community via the operator
? Enable metrics collection of services take-up by end users
? Assure a secure end user environment (e.g. integrity and authenticity of information).[/quote

The carriers:

Sony Ericsson
I wanted to get some hands-on time with the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 and there were a couple available at the SE booth. The X10 is powered by the 1GHz Snapdragon processor, has a beautiful 480 x 854 pixels WVGA display, has an 8 megapixel camera, and runs Android 1.6. The device is snappy and feels good in your hand. Sony Ericsson includes some visually appealing utilities that help you view history of your communications and enjoy media content. The device is scheduled to come to Canada, but I think we will probably see it come to AT&T here in the US this year too.

There were a lot of cool products at Digital Experience and it was great to see so many of my good friends on the show floor. Stay tuned for coverage of show floor booths, ebook readers, and more as I continue my trips around CES.

“This is very exciting because what we’re announcing is barcode interoperability,” said Diane Strahan, vice president of Mobile Services at NeuStar. “We truly mean across all platforms and media.”

Although there are various 2D barcode scanning initiatives worldwide, this marketing guide focuses on the US ecosystem as defined by an alliance of proactive carriers formed under the direction of CTIA - The Wireless Association®. Currently, the CTIA Code Scan Action Team (CCSAT) embraces an indirect barcode scanning method using the Data Matrix and EZ code formats.

Figure 1: Resolving a 2D Barcode
The indirect method encodes an identifier, rather than the campaign content or service address, into a 2D barcode. Following the diagram above, this identifier is resolved in the following manner:
• Step 1: An end user employs his or her camera-phone barcode reader to scan a 2D barcode.
• Step 2: The request together with the decoded identifier is sent through the carrier network to a Central Clearing House.
• Step 3: The Clearing House then determines if the identifier meets the criteria to be routed.
• Step 4a: If the criteria are met the identifier is routed to the Campaign Manager.
• Step 4b: If the criteria aren’t met an error message is sent to the end user.
• Step 5: In the final step the Campaign Manager resolves the destination address of the intended content or service on behalf of its customers (i.e. Code Publishers) and returns it to the barcode reader for action.

Short code registry NeuStar has launched new technology that allows mobile phones to scan and process two-dimensional bar codes regardless of the mobile service provider, scanning technology used or type of bar code symbology.

Based on open standards, the global pilot program is designed to show interoperability among leading bar code campaign managers, symbologies and code reader technology via NeuStar's third-party central clearinghouse and registry services.

"We're creating a ubiquitous interoperable solution just like short codes," said Diane Strahan, vice president of mobile services at NeuStar, Sterling, VA.

Neustar and NeoMedia Speed Up Widespread Implementation of Mobile 2D Barcodes
Licensing agreement unlocks the potential for "one click" two-dimensional barcode mobile marketing and commerce

Neustar announces a landmark agreement with NeoMedia Technologies Inc. to have Neustar act as the exclusive patent licensing agent in the U.S. for NeoMedia's intellectual property for two-dimensional (2D) barcodes. The agreement creates a "one stop shop" for consumer brands to simply and affordably use barcodes to deliver exciting new applications, services and compelling content to mobile consumers.

This is a smart move for both NeoMedia and Neustar. If NeoMedia’s intellectual property is easy and cost-effective to license through a trusted platform provider like Neustar, it can become the interoperable technology at the center of 2D implementation programs. It’s more valuable to NeoMedia to charge a reasonable license fee to encourage hundreds of ecosystem participants than to hold out for high fees from a few players who may not ramp up successfully. They, the wireless carriers and the creative agencies and brands will all reap the rewards of billions of 2D barcode scanning transactions once the technology penetrates the mass market.

Neustar brings a clear value to the 2D barcode ecosystem, including the lessons learned from managing the U.S. short code registry and other carrier services. Diane Strahan, vice president of Mobile Services at Neustar notes, “We are very excited about the 2D technology and the potential of this ecosystem to create a compelling and lucrative business opportunity for all players. Part of Neustar’s role is to keep the technology working in the background so that whenever a consumer scans a barcode it will resolve correctly and deliver a great interactive experience. The 2D barcode registry and clearinghouse services ensure interoperability across all the participating carriers – and any company building on the open standards will be able to participate in the ecosystem.”

Together, NeoMedia and Neustar look like the best candidates to lead the first really seamless, full-solution ecosystem for launching mass market 2D barcode campaigns and services in the United States.

I spoke with Iain McCready, CEO of NeoMedia, to get his take on the role of a smart ecosystem in 2D barcode adoption. Here are some of McCready’s observations.

Mary Cronin: NeoMedia has been a leader in partnering and interoperability pilots lately. Why is that a priority for you?

Iain McCready (pictured left): NeoMedia wants to see 2D barcodes succeed as a daily resource for billions of mobile phone subscribers. After years of competition, it became clear that no one company, no matter how great their technology was, could scale this market alone. In my experience, every leading brand and print publisher who sees a demo of 2D barcodes gets enthusiastic about how it can bring innovation and interactivity to their product marketing.

So everyone loves the technology. But marketing campaigns are planned around how many customers you can reach, how many devices, how many wireless subscribers. Getting the maximum participation in any campaign requires standards, interoperability among devices and readers, and also someone to be the registry and the clearinghouse for getting all the traffic to the right place based on the 2D barcode image scan. That means a large ecosystem of companies who are willing to put proprietary concerns second to creating a platform that will scale the market as a whole. That’s how NeoMedia looks at this opportunity – we want to help make it a big enough pie for all partners to benefit.

MC: I know that NeoMedia is active in Europe and Latin America and other areas of the world. What does your recent agreement with Neustar mean for the U.S. market in particular?

IM: The agreement makes 2D barcode services and technology accessible to many more companies and users. A lot of companies have been on the sidelines because of debates inside the industry about standards and interoperability and intellectual property ownership. It’s time to get beyond that and make it clear that interoperability has been proven and that anyone can join this ecosystem and have access to all the required technology. That gets rid of the remaining barriers to implementation and lets agencies and brands focus on the value proposition of 2D barcodes for their products.

MC: What’s your prediction about when the ecosystem strategy will pay off? Will 2010 finally be the year of 2D barcodes for mass market campaigns?

IM: I expect 2010 is going to be huge year; by the second half of 2010 we will begin to see scale and from that the market will take off. But we also know that mass market adoption is not going to happen overnight. There is still a lot of education to be done, and pilot projects to get new players familiar with the potential of 2D barcode interactions. So NeoMedia will be even more active in the coming year as the U.S. and global market takes off.

Google pitches white-spaces database

Google is reasserting itself as one of the driving forces behind the move to open the vacant spectrum that sits between TV channels to broadband use.

In a filing Monday with the Federal Communications Commission, the search giant threw its hat in the ring to serve as one of the companies that would administer a database of the so-called TV white spaces, a stipulation the FCC attached in its order to open the spectrum to unlicensed use for broadband service.

The commission mandated the database to ensure that mobile devices running on white-space spectrum wouldn't interfere with adjacent channels carrying TV signals, a primary concern the broadcasters' lobby raised throughout a vigorous campaign in opposition of the move to open the spectrum.

The devices that will be permitted to run on white-space networks will be required to have a geolocating capability that syncs to the database, which will assign them an unused frequency. Google banded with several other companies, including Motorola and NeuStar, last February to form the White Spaces Database Group, laying the groundwork for getting the project off the ground.

In October, a trial white-space network operating under a special exemption from the FCC went live, serving as a proof-of-concept that delivered broadband service to a rural community in Virginia.