Wi-Fi lets you watch TV in the karzy

UNIVERSAL MOBILE ACCESS (UMA) is almost universally viewed as a voice enabling technology. Basically it is the technology which has allowed the likes of BT to launch its infamous Bluephone service.However, UMA has far wider applications than mere voice, according to Kineto Wireless.

Currently the whole focus for UMA has been on combining two wireless technologies to enable voice calls in and outside the home. In BT's case, it is presently offering a cellular phone that utilises Bluetooth to communicate with an access point in the home. Phone calls can therefore be carried over the Internet while the subscriber is near to his or her home and then switched over to cellular outside of the home.

The number of Bluephone models has recently doubled (to two). Motorola can now apparently offer a version of the Razr which works with the service, too.

Kineto's director of marketing, Steve Shaw, admitted there was very little of his company's technology inside BT's Bluephone solution. Bascially the tin for that particular solution has been supplied by Ericsson and Motorola.

However, Shaw is more hopeful for trials currently being carried out by Telia Sonera in Scandinavia. These will use Wi-Fi as the wireless alternative to cellular. So far, Samsung with the T709; LG with the CL400 and Motorola with the A910 have all announced UMA compatible handsets supporting cellular plus Wi-Fi. Hopefully, the Swedes, Finns and Danes will be able to test all three out.

"The trouble is that all the operators want to talk about is voice," Shaw complained. UMA, however, can potentially swap any kind of application between Wi-Fi and cellular. The INQ suggested that mobile TV or streamed video would be an ideal candidate for such an application.

Shaw eagerly agreed that using UMA and Wi-Fi would solve the problem for 3G network operators for providing TV programmes over their networks. When the user went inside a building, the TV feed could easily be swapped over from 3G to Wi-Fi via UMA.

What Shaw didn't know, however, were the rumours emulating from a recent survey carried out by O2 in Cambridge, England on how people would watch TV on their mobile handsets. Publicly O2 has said that around 30 per cent of the time, triallists had been watching the TV indoors. The INQ has learnt, however, that in reality this meant that a whole bunch of triallists had been watching TV to pass the time while they were in the karsy (smallest room).

It's probably not the kind of application that Kineto is eager to publicise, though. µ