Microsoft Introduces Mobile Explorer

Microsoft aims to enable the use of the Internet, e-mail, location services, and e-commerce over mobile phones with hopes of Mobile Explorer becoming the stepping-stone for developing applications for new wireless technologies. Current services such as Microsoft Exchange Server, the BackOffice family, and MSN Mobile Services, will also be integrated into Mobile Explorer. In a press release issued today, Harel Kodesh, vice president of the Productivity Appliance Division at Microsoft said, "Microsoft's goal is to enable secure information access any time, anywhere, from the device of the users' choice."

Mobile Explorer will come in two versions, one for "smart phones" and the other for Web-ready "feature phones." Mobile Explorer for feature phones will include an operating-independent, browser based system. It will be the first dual-mode microbrowser that can display both HTML- and WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) 1.1-authored Internet content. Mobile Explorer for smart phones will include a full suite of personal management and Internet tools in addition to features offered on feature phones.

A strong supporter of Bluetooh, a low-cost technology to link wireless devices via radio waves, Microsoft will continue support the latest wireless technologies within Mobile Explorer.

Microsoft is expected to release the first version of Mobile Explorer in the first quarter of next year. It is currently under evaluation in the United Kingdom and Norway, and will soon appear in Korea and other countries throughout the world.

Microsoft’s wireless platform Web site may be found at http://www.microsoft.com/wireless