Innopath Software, a company that specialises in over-the-air mobile device management (MDM), and Red Bend Software have proposed a new format standard for the packaging and distribution of firmware over-the-air (FOTA) updates between companies within the mobile phone industry. The companies say implementing the proposed format will make the task of distributing FOTA updates from mobile handset manufacturers to mobile network operators, and between other parties, easier and less expensive.
RedBend and InnoPath say that interoperability standards are one of the key drivers responsible for the successful growth of the MDM market. and have agreed to collaborate to obtain approval on the new format, Package Ingest Container (PIC), as part of the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) Device Management (DM) standard specification, where it is currently in the proposal stage.
The companies say PIC is a format for packaging multiple FOTA updates with the relevant meta-data required by operators or other third parties to manage and deploy these updates. Implementing PIC will provide the mobile handset manufacturers, mobile network operators and MDM system vendors with a uniform information exchange format for the distribution of FOTA updates as well as mobile applications.
More information about the PIC format for firmware package ingest can be found on OMA website under http://member.openmobilealliance.org/ftp/Public_documents/DM/2005.