CTIA Wireless 2010 Preview: Top 5 Trends to Watch

The biggest wireless tech event in the U.S. gets underway next week in Las Vegas, and we’ll be there to bring you the hottest product announcements and our hands-on impressions of the latest gear straight from the show floor. What do we expect to see? A bigger push for 4G; faster, bigger smart phones (some from companies you might not expect); and apps that leverage your location in new ways. Oh, and more iPad competitors. Here are the top 5 trends to watch.

1. 4G Phone(s)!

If you believe the rumors, and the recent report from the Wall Street Journal, Sprint will unveil the HTC Supersonic next week, the first smart phone in the U.S. with 4G technology inside. The network, which is currently in 27 cities and will cover 120 million people by the end of the year, promises speeds between 3 and 6 Mbps. Sounds fast, but the best throughput we saw in Philadelphia with the Sprint Overdrive mobile hotspot was 3.4 Mbps. And it remains to be seen if those speeds will be diluted on the handset, which promises to pack a zippy Snapdragon processor and huge 4.3-inch AMOLED screen.

2. Tablets and Smartbooks Try to Steal iPad’s Thunder

Marvell, Nvidia, Qualcomm, and others will be at it again at CTIA, showing off closer-to-shipping wireless tablets and smarbooks. And they’ll have to compete with Apple’s iPad, which is already estimated to have hundreds of thousands of orders. We expect to see more polished versions of the Mobinova Beam and Lenovo Skylight, smartbooks that are  heading to AT&T (along with pricing). But I’m most interested  in seeing whether a carrier officially picks up the Notion Ink Adam tablet, which boasts a dual-mode ePaper/color display, full Flash support, and a swiveling camera. We first saw this breakthrough device at CES, but it was looking even better and slimmer at Mobile World Congress.

3. OS Wars, Revisited: Windows Phone 7 vs. Android vs. BlackBerry

A year ago, Microsoft was left for dead in the smart phone race, RIM was on top, and Android was just gathering steam. Now Android has a ton of momentum, Windows Phone 7 Series looks mighty promising (coming to phones by the end of the year), and RIM seems like it’s on the ropes. Perhaps we’ll get more hardware info out of Microsoft’s partners at CTIA in terms of specs, but I anticipate at least more hands-on time with the OS it continues baking.

And don’t count out BlackBerry yet. Just today what looks like BlackBerry OS 6.0 may have been leaked, which may be the software running the rumored BlackBerry slider. It seems to have lots of widgets and more info on the home screen, but we may not get the full scoop on the OS and device until RIM’s own WES 2010 event in late April. Symbian is also making another push to attract U.S. customers, but based on leaked footage of what’s coming next we don’t have the highest of hopes.

4. Location, Location…You Get the Idea

While Foursquare and Gowalla duke it out to be your local discovery app/game of choice, plenty of other companies want to tap into your whereabouts to deliver more helpful and relevant info on the go. Coupons.com will be showing off its location-award coupon app for the iPhone. Lokast from Nearverse lets you share media with others that are nearby. Snapfinger delivers location-specific menus from more than 30 national restaurant chains for when you get the munchies. And TeleNav and TomTom will also be showing off new apps (one not related to navigation).

5. Dell, Palm, Samsung, and Kyocera Step it Up.

Dell has already provided a sneak peek of its Mini 5/Streak device, a 5-inch Android tablet-phone that will likely be coming to AT&T, and the Mini 3 Android phone is also coming to the U.S. We expect to get more details on these devices and a better sense of whether the Round Rock giant will be able to compete against the established players.

Palm, which has struggled of late, could have something new to show as well, with CEO Jon Rubinstein saying yesterday that “we’re making great progress on future products.” Meanwhile, Samsung is hosting an S Life launch event (we have no idea what that means). And one of the original smart phone pioneers, Kyocera, will be jumping back into the smart phone fray at CTIA–at least according to promo e-mail for the Mobile Focus press event.