Huawei's soft switch for the first time relied more on software than on hardware, allowing operators to configure networks on the go as they added customers.
Motorola, for its part, has struggled to come up with an attractive portfolio of devices in recent years.But if pared-down smart-phones become the norm, handset-makers risk becoming sellers of commodity hardware while operators face a future as dumb pipes for data.
At the same time, a kind of arms race is underway when it comes to network security, with all sectors — hardware, software, operators and applications — investing staggering sums to meet a growing volume of attacks.
"Like the PC market, Android is on the verge of turning smartphone platforms into a one-horse race," he writes".Its low-cost services and user-friendly software remain wildly attractive to hardware makers, operators and consumers worldwide.
The OS currently has more than 20 hardware and operator backers globally.
A layer of middleware will manage and control a complex set of interconnections between teams of operators, hardware devices in various operating theatres, and databases managing tool and task logistics.
A Facebook spokeswoman referred to a statement on the company's mobile strategy: "We're working across the entire mobile industry; with operators, hardware manufacturers, OS providers, and application developers".
When asked Friday, Facebook did not deny or confirm that a project to build a smartphone existed, but pointed to a previous statement it gave to AllThingsD last year that said in part, "We're working across the entire mobile industry; with operators, hardware manufacturers, OS providers, and application developers".
The rising use of computer-like smartphones and netbook computers is creating new business opportunities for telecom network equipment makers such as Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, Nokia Siemens, Huawei and Cisco, which are producing new software and hardware to help operators manage the explosion of data on their networks.
