Verizon Will Open Network to All

Verizon Wireless sought to steal Google’s thunder on Tuesday as it promised to open its mobile network to all devices and mobile internet applications next year.

The move marks an apparent reversal of course by the second-biggest US mobile carrier in the face of Google’s agitation for a more open US wireless industry.

The internet company last month unveiled a package of free software to try to stimulate the development of handsets that are open to any internet service. It has also said it may bid in a spectrum auction in the US in January so that it can build an open wireless network of its own.

Lowell McAdam, Verizon Wireless’s chief executive, said the operator was responding to what it expected would be a “tidal wave of innovation” as technology companies race to produce new devices capable of handling wireless data.

Compared with the 50 or so handsets that are currently supported on its network, the number could “easily go to 500-plus” once developers take advantage of the new open network, said Mr McAdam.

However, analysts cautioned that the full impact of Verizon’s move would depend on the details of its implementation and that the company would stop short of doing anything that would threaten its current business model.

US mobile operator networks are more restrictive than many of their counterparts in other countries and the move to allow any device or service access to their networks could potentially reduce their role to commodity suppliers of bandwidth.

“It’s a gesture,” said John Jackson, an analyst at Yankee Group. “I hardly think Verizon will put itself at risk by letting people run roughshod over its network with Skype handsets and Slingboxes” – a reference to internet services that rival Verizon’s own voice and video offerings.

“The question is, how does it work in practice, and what is the price?” said Blair Levin, a former Federal Communications Commission official.

Verizon Wireless said it would make the technical specifications for handsets to connect to its network available early next year, adding that any new devices would first have to be tested in its own labs to make sure they do not harm the network.

Mr McAdam said that users of any new open handsets were likely to be charged based on the amount of bandwidth they use on the Verizon network. That approach may discourage high-bandwidth services like video and is more restrictive than the flat-rate pricing that many mobile companies are adopting to encourage greater wireless internet use.

Most customers are also likely to continue to buy handsets through Verizon’s existing retail stores, given the big handset subsidies and flat-rate pricing used by US mobile operators, said Mr Jackson. “This is kind of a bet on their existing business model,” he added.