Qualcomm a long time partner of Telstra in the development of technology for their NextG Network is set to reveal a brand new home computing device that uses mobile phone processors to deliver home computing capabilities.
Telstra has already been shown the device which is set to be revealed for the first time next in New York with Qualcomm insiders saying that Australia could well be used as a test market for the device.
The device which is called “Kayak” can be plugged into a display screen allowing users to access the web and other applications. It is expected that it will cost around $399 however it does need a keyboard and mouse.
Qualcomm is not interested in manufacturing or selling the device themselves, instead they will licence the design for Kayak as well as provide the chipsets to manufacturers. The company says trials of prototype units, manufactured by Taiwan-based Inventec will be conducted during the first quarter of 2009 in Southeast Asia and possibly Australia.
The price of the device could be even lower if Telstra offer hardware subsidies in exchange for a monthly service fee with the device being sold as an offering on their NextG wireless network.
The Wall Street Journal reports “We are not calling it a computer,” said Luis Pineda, senior vice president of marketing and product management for Qualcomm’s CDMA Technologies unit. “It’s a computing device that allows you to have Internet access.”
Qualcomm who are in a head to head battle with Intel in the development of new mobile technology plan to reveal a new chip called Snapdragon which operates at a faster speed and has two processing units rather than one. This processor will be used in a new generation of portable devices however it will not be able to run Windows Mobile applications.
