'We'll have at least two phones each in the future'

Our pockets will be even more crammed in the future because we’ll all be carrying at least two phones around with us. That’s according to Real Networks CEO Rob Glaser – he thinks that mobile phones can only do so much, and it'll be necessary to carry two to get all the functionalities you’ll want from your handset, Ars Technica reports.

It isn’t possible to create a handset that suits everyone’s needs and does everything "without any compromise", Glaser said at last week’s Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona.

More functionality

Discrepancies when it comes to input methods, size, and functionality between devices is a problem, Glaser explained. As a result, he predicted, we'll have to carry multiple devices to get all the functionality we want. This is already happening, with people having a PDA-style phone like a BlackBerry while still using a traditional mobile phone handset too.

"Mobile penetration won't stop at 100 per cent," Glaser said at MWC. "It will go to 200 per cent because the notion of a single device that does it all isn't the way (the market is) going to go."

Glaser urged the mobile industry to shape up; he called for better, more capable devices, with easy-to-use software, and straightforward and affordable data plans. We’re eagerly awaiting the first Android-powered handsets, due out later this year, to see if they fulfil these wishes.