Faced with stagnant growth in developed markets like Europe, Japan and the United Together, the wireless industry is watching with interest to older people, who until now thought they could do without a cell phone, those who can not use what they have.
IBM said the software developed in the program, which also involved the National Institute of Design in India and the University of Tokyo, will be offered as an open source, and other materials developed will also be publicly available to governments and businesses .
Industry watchers said the telecommunications IBM program met a real need.
"As the population in Europe and North America age, the need for specialized mobile devices will become more intense, "said Ben Wood, director of research at British consultancy CCS Insight.
" Phone manufacturers need to adapt if they want to attract a generation that has grown up with mobile but can not use them as often, "he said.
Major handset vendors like Nokia and Samsung Electronics have produced phones with large buttons and simple designs, but have avoided specifically marketed for older children.
This has opened the market for companies smaller as the family firm and Austrian Emporia Swedish Doro, whose recent study showed that most people over 65 in developed markets already have a cell phone. Emporia
focused only on older phones for a few years ago after his mother retired CEO Albert Fellner, he usually asked to help him use the phone.
"I always drove me crazy with your phone. Every two weeks I had to explain how to use it. I gave up. I said, I'll know to use a telephone," said Fellner.
His colleague at IBM Research, Chieko Asakawa, research program manager, has a similar personal experience. She is blind, and his first cell phone in the 1990's was used primarily for voice communication, rather than for text or other uses.
"There was a telephone available. Just used it to dial and call," he said.
Source: Reuters
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