Many of us are having a love affair with our mobile phones. But for all their appeal, these devices and the networks that support them are often less than reliable, given dropped calls, uneven application performance, and drained batteries. That’s why Carrier IQ got into business six years ago – to provide more intelligence on how and why mobile devices and networks act as they do. Now the company is expanding its capabilities to bring end users more into the loop.
Carrier IQ software runs on handsets (first feature phones and smartphones) and can store up to 200 kbytes of information on phones that can help explain how, when and where a call failed, for example, or how applications are affecting phone and battery performance. (It’s important to gather that information at the handset, says Andrew Coward, vice president of marketing and product management for Carrier IQ, because the source of such issues can come from the network or the end point.)
The company long ago outfitted its service provider customers with a dashboard that shows what’s happening on a per subscriber basis in terms of mobile user experience; application, phone and battery performance; the source of crashes; and the like. Now Carrier IQ is working with its mobile service provider customers to put a subset of that information into the hands of end users, explains Coward, who spoke to TMCnet this week at Mobile World Congress (News - Alert) in Barcelona, Spain.
End users are increasingly playing a more active role in mobile application, device and service selection. This addresses the trend of the pro-active mobile user. At the same time, wireless service providers at once want to make their services stickier while lowering customer support costs. The end user dashboard can meet both carrier goals as well, says Coward.
Looking to the future, adds Coward, Carrier IQ aims to leverage its understanding of the demands and behaviors of mobile applications to address mobile security.
Edited by Jennifer Russell