From carriers to content providers to messaging companies, everybody in wireless wants to drive data revenues. And a couple of companies are focusing on users’ fingers.
Digit Wireless Inc. hopes to boost text-messaging activity and minimize cumbersome user interface issues with its Fastap keypad, an offering designed to expand traditional 12-key mobile phones into full-fledged text-friendly devices. Fastap-equipped phones feature 26 dedicated letter keys placed at the corners of each number key, expanding the familiar layout.
The letter keys are smaller and slightly raised above their number counterparts, allowing users to bang out a text message, e-mail or instant messages quicker than triple-tapping. And the keypad offers alternatives to often-painful carrier decks, enabling users to hold down one of a handful of keys to launch a wireless Web session, for instance, or launch a photo-messaging application.
Digit enters the U.S. market this week, teaming with LG Electronics Co. Ltd. and Alltel Corp. to launch the LG AX490. The handset-which resembles a race car and carries the markings of Alltel-sponsored NASCAR driver Ryan Newman-supports instant messaging and multimedia applications designed to take advantage of Fastap technology and spur lucrative data usage.
Alltel hopes the expanded keypad encourages users to send more text messages, which can lead them to try other applications such as photo-messaging and surfing the wireless Web, according to Craig Kirkland, Alltel’s director of messaging and voice services.
“For people who don’t use data today, we view (text messaging) as an entry point” for other services, said Kirkland. And subscribers who get used to the expanded keypad are more likely to attempt more complicated offerings.
“It takes one-fourth as many taps to enter an e-mail address or URL (with Fastap),” he continued, “and you want that first time to be a pleasant experience.”
Digit claims 15 employees and is backed by Qualcomm Inc. and Canadian operator Telus Mobility, which became the first carrier to offer Fastap last year. Telus claims the technology spurred a dramatic increase in text messaging, as users with Fastap phones sent more than twice as many text messages as users of other phones. That usage stayed strong, according to Digit Chief Executive Officer Mark Connon, and extended to other mobile data applications.
“They saw a 116-percent increase in SMS usage-it went to that and it stayed at that,” Connor said. “Everything, across the board, was increased.”
Immersion on LG too
Immersion Corp., meanwhile, struck its own deal with LG. The San Jose, Calif.-based startup said the handset manufacturer has licensed its VibeTonz technology, which offers “vibro-tactile effects” that make phones vibrate and pulse. The feature-which uses the same motor that allows phones to vibrate instead of ringing-is designed to underscore the beat or melody of ringtones, provide touch feedback during mobile gaming sessions and provide alerts for dropped calls and messages.
“You can feel it raining, or when a character is hugging you, you can feel a heartbeat,” said Mark Belinsky, Immersion’s vice president of corporate strategy. “By virtue of how long we’ve been doing this, we can generate all kinds of tactile sensations.”
LG plans to use Immersion’s software development kit and APIs to develop touch-enabled applications and media.
Indeed, while Digit defines the label “startup,” Immersion has gained solid ground deploying its technology on other platforms. The 12-year-old company provides vibrating functionality for computer and console games, and its partners include Microsoft Corp., Logitech, 3M and Gemini/Philips Electronics.
