Google Phone(Gphone), what is the hype all about

There is so much written about Google phone. I thought of taking a dig at it to understand the hype, and analyzing the impact Google phone will have in the wireless industry.
I personally feel Google phone is a great idea coming from a great company. It makes perfect sense to blend in all the Google apps on the mobile. Currently, Google has been trying to partner with so many vendors to integrate their apps as part of the handset. I don’t think they were very successfull or satisfied, in getting most of the vendors and operators, to integrate with their apps. However, they did have good success in Europe.
Here is a list of Google apps that will make a great app on the mobile
Gmail
What more do u need on the handset. Free email access, that’s a great deal compared to blackberry. Isn’t it? Anyway, good tool for business guys. Keep these guys happy, this is where the money comes.

Google Talk
I always loved VOIM (Voice over IM). I strongly feel this is one of the cool features, which would let me carry my IM groups on my handset. What a powerful feature; with a click of a button, I can chat, change my presence status and engage in a voice call with a contact or a group of contacts.
I’m sure you could do so many things with this app. Worthy of mention is Google’s grand central acquisition, im seeing a FMC kind of feature that can be integrated with handset( probably with WIFI or a Data connection in the handset). With this combo, some interesting apps can be put together for enterprise. I will cover that later in my blog.

Blogger
My favorite tool, lets me share my thoughts with others. Anyways, blogging from handset is not something cool yet. If Google can come up with something optimized for handset; believe me most of the netizens are going to love that.

Google Maps
Just imagine you could have so many mashups with GPS enabled in the handset and what more; Google has its own maps database. With additional API support for handset, I can see so many mashups. Caution, depends on the handset OS model to support API. Most of the handset vendors don’t provide access to all the required hardware or software. Lots of LBS based services possible. Hope they come up with GPS based handset. Take a look at my previous post for some interesting location based services.

Calendar
Would love to sync up my meetings, events synced up between gmail and the handset. You can create invitations; send reminders from your phone. What more, you could this and even more with your handset for FREE.

Google Docs
Now I have an option of editing my documents on mobile and web. What a cool feature, helps me being more productive. Not that I want to be one. Road warriors will love this feature. Though this feature is already supported by many other companies, it makes more sense when you have a complete package from one vendor.

Picasa
I can now take a picture from my handset and post to my blogger, picasa or my private virtual data server. Simple interface to upload and download my video and picture to anywhere I want.

Virtual Data Cloud
You can access all the data (music, documents etc) right from your handset running Google apps. I think Google CEO always talks about virtual data cloud, where your data is some where on the net and all you need is an application to access your contents (private or public). Imagine you could edit documents that were left unfinished on your laptop while leaving the office. It’s an extension to your work desktop/laptop. All you data, pictures and videos are accessible right from your handset screen.

Google Search
Finally the big one, search from your handset. You could still do that with your handset with data package. I feel Google is going to come up with some optimized version for handset that is far slicker compared to the existing web browser based search.

Looking at all these different applications above, it definitely rings the bell to me. Im sure somebody is having sleepless nights trying to figure out how to stump Google into entering their territory. Yep, im talking about Microsoft.
What’s missing is their own backbone network for voice calling, mobile OS and a web browser. Wow, I can’t wait for the day when Google has its own OS with a mobile browser that is optimized for the form factor of handset.
I think Google is chasing the cell-phone advertisement market, which is a potential $11 billion dollars. In future, if things turn out to be true, we would be seeing services on mobile to be free of cost with ad supported model. I have my own concerns/doubts about free ad supported voice service. I’m not going to dwell into it for now. Having said that, we are talking about a giant which can turn things around and teach people how to make money.
Here are some interesting links to this news
Reuter News about Google Phone
Wall Street News about Google Phone
Observer News about Google Phone