Yet the reality, increasingly, is that they can't and don't leave the bubble -- the bubble moves right along with them, except that it is no longer merely a bubble, it is a heavily fortified multiple-city-block mobile bunker.
But it seems Apple might have to foot a part of the subsidy bill and take a hit on margins for such a contract to happen. (see Apple Faces China Mobile-Sized Stumbling Block Limiting China Upside Potential) Penetrating China could mean long-term margin pressures as well as the company seeks to compete against the rapidly growing Android market, mitigated to an extent by the carrier subsidies.
Representative Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) is tapping Wu for advice on legislation that would make it illegal for phone companies to block access to the Internet on mobile devices.
The project was born in this very space, eventually moving to a building in San Francisco's SoMa district a block or so away, the mobile payment company having opted not to travel too far from the place where it was first conceived.
Mr. Cleveely had called for one small block of spectrum to be released unlicensed to allow anyone to operate a low-power device that used mobile broadband frequencies.