OpenPeak Gone Uncommunicative?

There was time, not that long ago, when I thought that an OpenPeak tablet would surely be in my future. Based in South Florida, OpenPeak was the company behind both of Verizon’s Home Hub offerings. I suspect that they’re the force behind their soon to be launched  home automation offer as well.

The OpenPeak product line initially had a significant telephony component. While basically a tablet offer, the line included a DECT/CATiq base and cordless handsets OEM’d from Gigaset. They had a nice looking executive desk phone as well.

I had thought that OpenPeak might be the first to make an impact in the enterprise desk phone space using Android. Or perhaps they would get some traction in the high-end hotel niche? They seemed to be out in front of the pack. Cloud Telecomputers “Glass” product has yet to see an delivery, even after being seen on demo at Astricon 2010.

I was pleased to see news from Open Peak arising out of CES last week. However, I was also very surprised to see that all signs of telephony have been removed from the product line. I guess that they’ve redefined their core feature set and in so doing written out voice communications.

This is especially puzzling given their reliance upon the carrier community as their retail channel. Witness the fact that their only North American product offerings (AFAIK) having been though Verizon Wireless.

Verizon basically shot themselves in the HUB. They insisted upon excessive control over the platform, then priced it beyond its value. They took an open and very promising device and “Verizoned” it into irrelevance.

Yes, I do think that  to be “Verizoned” is now a very valid verb context to that name.

Given the flurry of activity around tablets, and the number of new entrants into that game, I wonder if dropping so ubiquitous a service as voice is wise? Perhaps the carriers forced the issue, as I see that the Samsung Galaxy Tab is shipping in a voice-hobbled variant to US carriers, but in full voice elsewhere.

I wonder if all the coming wave of tablets will be deaf and mute?