mobile solution group

Since 2000 60 firms and research institutes work in close co-operation on the development of mobile applications in Bremen. Work is coordinated and managed by mobile solution group GmbH.

The members of the mobile solution group represent the relevant RTD know how as well as the necessary commercial background for a successful market deployment. The group is again member of a national activity, the mobile media-initiative launched by German federal Ministry for Economy. Adding to that, the msg co-operates with Deutsche Telekom AG (T-Info) and currently negotiates to extend co-operation to T-Mobile as well.

Actively supported by local government policy and business development latest technologies (4G) for mobile applications are being firmly established in Bremen. Providing the required technical infrastructure, i.e. cellular networks, WLAN hot spots and Digital Terrestrial TV is on top of the list of priorities. Sustainability remains the overall goal - beyond implementing the results of singular research project, a common baseline for market introduction and market penetration has to be developed.

The government of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen, the Senate, therefore has initiated plans for the establishment of a Mobile Research and Solution Center on the premises of the University campus in 2005. The mobile solution group plays a major role in the preparation of this big investment. The foundation of the groups legal entity, the mobile solution group GmbH, forms an important landmark in this respect.

There is close co-operation between science and economy in the mobile solution group. Internationally acknowledges research institutes, e.g. TZI (Center for Computing Technology), IKOM (Institute for Communications Technologies) and BIBA (Bremen Institute for Industrial Technology and Applied Work Science) of the University of Bremen and WCG (Wireless Communications Group) of the International University of Bremen are working together with local SMEs, as well as with global players like Telekom and manufacturers of mobile devices. These co-operations gives proof of the valuable contribution of science and engineering disciplines for the economic development of this city. Joining under one roof these counterparts, application oriented research one side and commercial exploitation on the other, is the particular idea behind the Mobile Research and Solution Center. RTD of mobile application is not local business. It is subject of international research programs and standardization efforts. Participation of members of the msg in joined international research projects has a long history and is just expression of the well-known fact that hanseatic means cosmopolitan.

Sustainable developments and continuity in market deployment require co-operation and conformance to existing and evolving standards. Based on these paradigms the mobile solution group developed an open-system architecture for the delivery of multimedia content to various client platforms. This architecture will be implemented to become an open platform for all those interested in providing own mobile services. Basic functionalities, e.g. billing and accounting, personalization, localization and a common content management interface will be provided by this msg-platform. The system will be able to feed multimedia content into different (mobile) distribution channels. Which content goes to which channel is up to the service providers. Requisites for mobile services are splendid in Bremen: the city is one of Deutsche Telekom’s UMTS-test beds, the University campus and large parts of the city center are equipped with WLAN access points and in May 2004, Digital Terrestric TV is going "on air" - reserving a 6.6 Mbit/s transmission bandwidth for mobile multimedia applications!

Activities encompass setup of technical infrastructure as a pre-requisite for the development and deployment of mobile applications, as well as RTD in the area of new transmission standards and client devices, definition of application scenarios and business models, software development, content integration for delivery into different feeds (GSM, GPRS, Bluetooth, UMTS, Wireless LAN, DVB-T / DVB-H).

Services offered include:

• Planning of new mobile services
  
• Market scenarios and assessment of profitability
  
• Marketing models
  
• Project management