Google's Vision for the Mobile Revolution

Google chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt writing for Harvard Business Review Preparing for the Big Mobile Revolution.

Summing up:
#1 - Fast underlying networks - gotta love that
#2 - Mobile payments using phone - pretty cool, I like it
and
#3 - A billion people (including the poorest parts of the world) with inexpensive browser-based touchscreen phones - can't argue with that

I guess he forgot #4 - Google's mobile ads

In the end, Schmidt and Google answer to their shareholders. While he says:

Can you imagine how this will change their awareness of local and global information and their notion of education?

I think what he means is: Can you imagine our mobile ads served up to 2 billion eyeballs?


Here's the relevant part of Schmidt's article:

First, we must focus on developing the under­lying fast networks (generally called LTE). These will be 8-to-10- mega­bit networks, roughly 10 times what we have today, which will usher in new and creative applications, mostly entertainment and social, for these phone platforms. 

Second, we must attend to the development of mobile money. Phones, as we know, are used as banks in many poorer parts of the world—and modern technology means that their use as financial tools can go much further than that.

Third, we want to increase the availability of inexpensive smartphones in the poorest parts of the world. We envision literally a billion people getting inexpensive, browser-based touchscreen phones over the next few years.