[via Anish] Om Malik writes about what the incoming chief of Texas Instruments, Rich Templeton, thinks:
The dawn of the wireless age will prove to be the end of laptop, according to Rich Templeton. Speaking during a keynote session at the 3GSM World Congress in Cannes, France, Templeton pointed to wireless technologys ability to provide a low-cost, low-power platform to make it practical to expand the value of a cell phone beyond voice [capability] Were not far from the day when smartphones are projected to outsell laptop and desktop computers combined.
Templeton predicts that cell phones will soon become the prevailing devices worldwide for accessing the Internet, listening to music, capturing & watching video, and for organizing personal information. The ability to combine multiple applications into multi-purpose, feature-rich cell phones (beyond just voice) will create a heightened consumer demand for these smartphones. Were not far from the day when smartphones are projected to outsell laptop and desktop computers combined Last year, cameraphones became the best selling cameras outpacing digital still cameras, which themselves surpassed film cameras for the first time.
I don’t necessarily think laptops will whither, but I definitely see an increase in the use of thin clients as part of the core IT infrastructure in organisations. When networks are high-speed, reliable and ubiquitous, why bother with doing processing and storage locally? Especially, when cost is an issue.
