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Wireless communication and the business consumer are closely interlinked in today’s world. SDA Asia spoke to Angela Wilde, Regional Managing Director in Greater Pacific, GN Netcom, to understand GN Netcom’s role in the wireless communications market, its business strategy to drive revenue and such. Angela spoke about GN’s collaboration with Microsoft regarding the Unified Communications platform and more. Read on…

SDA: Can you provide us with insight into how the business consumer and wireless communication is entangled?

Angela Wilde (AW): The business consumer and wireless communication is interlinked today. Technology today is what we call at the convergence stage. The convergence of wireless communication and gullible networks. This brings in a whole new era of learning and working and getting on with business. The business consumer and the organisation are getting leaner and more mobile you need to come with technology that caters to such a lifestyle, this is a major consideration.

SDA: What are the latest trends in the wireless communications industry?

AW: If we look at the APAC region we are certainly seeing an uptake in wireless communications in the more mature markets—for example in Singapore. This is driven by a number of factors like reducing overall costs, reducing call costs, operations, management.

The growth from the uptake from the commercial sector as well is a major revenue driver in the APAC region, it accounts for 64 per cent. Thus there is immense growth in the business sectors.

SDA: Please brief us about GN's focus on Unified Communications and the Company’s plans for the coming quarters.

AW: Unified communications is considered to be the driver in today’s increasingly mobile work environment. Today we can integrate voice communications with communications and collaboration experiences.

GN Netcom collaborated with Microsoft’s Unified Communications Groups to supply office PC peripheral headsets for IP telephony, audio, video, web conferencing and instant messaging.

GN Netcom is playing a significant role in the development of PC peripheral devices that work with Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2007 and Microsoft Office Communicator 2007 today.

GN Netcom has provided Microsoft’s customers with a wide variety of device solutions for IP telephony, speech recognition, video conferencing, Internet chat and multimedia applications in a broad range of wearing styles.

The roadmap for the company is to continue to roll out Unified Communications. We can certainly be looked as a company that provides robust Unified Communications. For example in Japan GN has collaborated with Microsoft Vista to provide several wireless products for Microsoft Vista, this is a move in the direction of Unified Communication strategy for businesses.

SDA: Tell us about the role GN Netcom plays in today's wireless office headset industry and the qualities that have propelled the company to what it is today.

AW: The market is growing at an average of 20 per cent yearly. GN is the global number one headset supplier (including its popular Jabra brand of headsets). We build on our R&D capability and work with and make wireless communications more cost-effective and performance efficient. So our product is about quality, customer choice and it is leveraging on innovations.

We make sure we have quality in terms of design, we also make sure we have a portfolio to address customer choice and business need. And also making sure what our customer needs and we provide for that need.

SDA: In December 2006, GN Netcom presented 'The Learning Place'. Can you tell us more about it? How does it fit into today's wireless communications concept?

AW: The ‘Learning Place' is basically a communications programme and allows you to learn a particular subject by virtual means. It encourages distance education programmes. This allows a combination of corded and wireless headsets.

SDA:SDA: The market is becoming increasingly crowded with 'me-too' products, so vendors are endeavouring to motivate channel sales people. This type of scheme will become increasingly commonplace. How will you tackle this?

AW: We are looking forward to significant expansion of our offerings. Not only are the numbers of available assistive technologies increasing, but so are the numbers of individuals using them.

Adaptable computer interfaces, ergonomic keyboards, portable devices, voice recognition and artificial speech - all of these were developed for or first adopted by assistive technology manufacturers and their customers. Because "assistive technology" is all about making things easier to use, it has mainstream applications. The impact of technology on daily life has really just begun. The technologies being developed today are the future of the high-tech industry, available to accommodate a variety of needs.