About iHand - One Device, One Number, One Dream
[Abstract]
A
virtualized Open Wireless Architecture (OWA) layer is designed between
the physical transmission layer and the user application and operating
system (OS) layers to provide a converged open radio transmission
platform, and provide a solution to make the application and OS layers
to be independent to the wireless transmission layer. The OWA
virtualization layer defines the portable wireless air-interface modules
corresponding to the physical radio transmission technologies (RTTs) to
enable the flexible change of different RTTs by an external memory card,
and facilitates the visitor OS operable upon the host OS of the mobile
terminal device to support seamless handover and switch between
different OS platforms.
[Summary]
 The
conventional mobile terminal device including the hottest xPhone mobile phone system
has many technical limitations which become the critical issues for the
future development. The major problems of the conventional mobile
terminal system include:
System architecture is very closed. Every mobile phone vendor
has its own architecture and all systems modules come from same
vendor or its partners only.
Every mobile phone is limited to its specific wireless
standards or called Radio Transmission Technologies (RTTs), and does
not allow flexibility in selecting different RTTs.
Some multi-standards mobile phone is just coupling several
separate RTTs into the system which consumes much power and system
resources, and unused RTTs can not be removed from the system.
Every mobile phone is locked to its own operating system (OS),
and do not allow any applications if their OS is different from its
own OS.
The whole system architecture relies directly or indirectly on
the physical radio transmission layer.
 Because of these architectural problems, the mobile phone becomes one of
the most least cost-effective consumer products based on the report from
2007 World Wireless Congress. The user can not upgrade or improve the
mobile phone due to its closed architecture and lock to specific RTT and
OS platform.
 The
mobile applications are facing tremendous development and movement
across the global and will continue to evolve from a traditional
voice-centric service to the multimedia services including voice, data,
message and video. These multimedia services may run on same OS
platform or come from different OS platforms developed by third party
vendor or ported from other system platforms such as computer system.
Developing all mobile applications upon same single OS platform is very
costly and do not make any sense in the commercial business market.
 Meanwhile, these multimedia applications require the underlying wireless
transmission to be broadband, high-speed and full mobile. However, from
the wireless communication’s point of view, no single wireless standard
(or called radio transmission technology) can provide both broadband
high-speed and seamless mobility features based on the communication
theory.
Therefore, in order to support the multimedia applications for the
mobile phone device, multiple RTTS must work together as a converged
radio platform rather than a single RTT system.
In
order to solve the problems existed in the conventional mobile wireless
communications, and meet the goals as mentioned above, improvement of
the current wireless system architecture is the only and final solution.
The Open Wireless Architecture (OWA) approach has been proposed to
achieve the above goals and shifted the wireless mobile terminal
technology from a transmission-specific radio system to an
interface-based open system platform for the complete openness and
simplicity of the future mobile terminal device.
 This invention virtualizes an OWA System Layer between the physical
transmission layer and the high user application and operating system
layers to ensure their complete independence and openness in both
architectures and operations.
The OWA
Virtualization Layer comprises all the system level functions
including OWA Baseband processing, Wireless adaptation and
virtualization, OWA BIOS (basic input/output system) Interface and
Framework, Software Defined Modules, Host and Visitor OS interfaces,
and Open OS BIOS (basic input/output system) which will be
implemented by one single SoC (system on chip) silicon chip called
OWA Baseband Chip.
 This invention is
implemented in iHand - the next generation smart phone platform.
iARM is the Virtual Mobile Server and Controller for iHand to
optimize the wireless spectrum utilization and synchronize the
applications, services and networks for iHand mobile
device. iARM is also designed as a portable smart OWA card to
turn consumer electronics into the 4th generation mobile
phone/device converging multiple wireless air-interfaces (GSM, CDMA,
OFDM, WIFI and WiMAX) in one open architecture platform. The iHand is the converged mobile phone supporting
any wireless standards by inserting different wireless interface SIM
cards or multiple interfaces in one SIM card, and the integrated
communication device of home phone, office phone and mobile phone.
The iARM is the mobile internet terminal unit installed
in the car/vehicle system, laptop computer, portable consumer
electronic device, and/or the Virtual Mobile Server for the
iHand devices. The iARM synchronizes with iHand
(or multiple iHands), and can serve as the mobile server for all
applications, services and network accesses of iHand.
 Based on The
Churchill Club's Top 10 Tech Trends,
Vinod Khosla
of Khosla Ventures and
Roger McNamee of
Elevation Partners both pointed out that "The mobile phone will
be a mainstream personal computer", and "The mobile device
migration to smart phones from features phones will produce even
greater disruption than PC industry moving from character mode to
graphical interface.
Within 5 years, everything that matters to you
will be available to you on a device that fits on your belt or in
your purse".
Joe Schoendorf of Accel Partners further predicted "80% of
the world population will carry mobile Internet devices within 5-10
years". The Open Wireless Architecture (OWA) technology
is the optimal solution to ensure openness, simplicity and cleanness
of your future mobile phone which is called iHand - The
World in Hand.
[Applications]
Applications for which iHand
well-suited:
1. (INT) Internet/Web browsing
2. (INT) Search, look up information on Internet
3. (COM) e-mail (check/reply)
4. (COM) SMS/text messaging
5. (COM) IM/online chat (with or without video)
6. (COM) Video conferencing/calling
7. (COM) Video sharing (see what I see)
8. (COM) VoIP phone calls (via Skype, Fring, etc.)
9. (COM) Mobile phone calls (traditional cellular)
10. (EDU) View lessons, instructions
11. (ENT) Listen to audio (music, books on tape, etc.)
12. (ENT) Play games (individual and/or multiplayer)
13. (ENT) View video (including TV)
14. (LBS) Maps and Directions (with built-in GPS)
15. (LBS) Other location-based services
16. (PROD) Calendar/Contacts/Address book
17. (PROD) Read news, books, other media
18. (PROD) Read Office documents
19. (PROD) Take notes (meetings, lectures, etc.)
20. (PROD) Write/edit documents (article, updates)
21. (PROD) Post to blogs
22. (SOC) Take photos with built-in camera
23. (SOC) Record video
24. (SOC) Connect, post to social networking sites (like Facebook)
25. (SOC) Upload/share user-generated content (photos, etc.)
26. (BUS) Retrieve/download data (for realtors, salespeople, etc.)
27. (BUS) Enter/upload data (orders, field reports, etc.)
28. (BUS) Multimedia presentation (e.g., to customers)
29. (SEC) Banking, medical and private
30. (SEC) Identification, passport and driver license
For more information about the technical specifications
and/or technical whitepaper, please
contact the office of Chief Architect Prof. Willie Lu at: sieneon<at>gmail.com or
contact<at>sieneon.com. iHand/iARM are developed in both US
and China 4G Centers. Some IEEE publications on OWA technology are
available at the USCWC website.
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