Sony PSP Adds Chat and VoIP

Sony said it will add chat services, Internet telephony and video-to-video communications to its popular PlayStation Portable game unit, an upgrade the Japanese company hopes will transform the PSP into wireless multimedia communications device.

Sony said Wednesday it had struck a four-year deal with British Telecom to provide these and other services on the PSP. The new units are scheduled to be shipped by the end of the year and owners of existing PSPs will eligible to receive an upgrade for these services.

Sony and BT said further partnerships are expected, but neither company would say with whom. Likely partners could include Internet video or photo sites, other VoIP services and wireless hotspot providers. The move could help the PSP, which has sold more than 25 million units since its launch in late 2004, close the gap with the leading Nintendo DS portable console.

The new device will also now face tough competition in the market for converged multimedia wireless devices, said Geof Blaber, senior analyst at UK-based consultancy CCS Insight. He said mobile phones such as Nokia’s N95 will be a particularly tough competitor.

He predicted that usage will be mainly amongst gamers wanting peer-to-peer communications and that this may be too small a market to make it interesting. “Ultimately the PSP is a gaming device,” he said.

Earlier this month Sony announced its Go!Cam video camera PSP add-on. Together with a PSP it allows up to two and half hours of video over 40,000 photos to be recorded. It also features a built-in microphone, the ability to change the direction of the camera lens vertically by 180 degrees and comes with Go!Edit video, photo and audio editing software.

“When you have a screen of such good quality as that on the PSP and a high quality camera that can be fitted to it, the natural next step is video communications,” said Warren Buckley, director of portfolio convergence at BT. This could encompass two-way video communications or uploading, downloading or just viewing video, he added.

A key attraction of the PSP is that it could be updated by users to add new features. There was no web browser, for example, on the first PSPs but one was added soon after launch and not only made available on new models but could also be upgraded by existing owners.