In 1998, vendors shipped some 1.4 million smart handheld devices in Western Europe, a number which did not live up to market expectations, McKenzie said.
The smart phone market is expected to take off much faster in Europe than in the U.S., according to Alison McKenzie, research manager in charge of IDC's smart handheld devices group in London.
But although the new architectures may lower the cost of smart handheld devices, new types of Web content will likely be necessary before users will want to surf the Web while walking down the street, Turley commented.
In this third cycle the unleashing of wireless broadband connectivity in handheld smart phones and smart tablets will be like proverbial fuel on the fire.
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Hitachi's SH3-DSP integrated RISC architecture is optimized to allow smart phones and other handheld devices to access information from the Internet.
And just a few years hence, wireless interactive access devices, such as smart mobile telephones and handheld computers, are expected to offer easy Internet access on the move.
Mr Kusnetzky predicted that sales of information appliances - from stripped down terminals used primarily to access to the internet, to smart mobile phones and handheld computers such as the Palm Pilot - would outpace PC sales by 2004.
The communications processor business includes the IXP family of network and communications chips used in networking products and Intel's Xscale application chips are used in cell phones, handheld computers, and smart phones.
Huang is also pushing into the handheld business, as demand for smart phones booms, particularly in the developing world.
Along with Microsoft's new generation of Internet-oriented software, users will need other non-software technologies tailored for the Web, such as broadband access, wireless communications, smart cards, phones with large screens, handheld computers and PCs with integrated microphones and cameras, Gates said.
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As the largest maker of flash memory products, SanDisk stands to benefit greatly from the proliferation of smart phones, MP3 music players, tablet computers and other handheld devices that use such memory.
It has built handheld devices for archrivals Dell and Hewlett-Packard, smart phones that run the Palm and Windows Mobile operating systems.
Apple may be a cult sensation of sorts in the handheld device market, a media darling, but when it comes to smart phones, no one touches the Android operating system by Google.
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