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According to a report in tomorrow’s Business Week, developers are building applications for the Google Phone. I mentioned the gPhone on 27 August. This 6 September article has additional details.

Of course, everyone has signed non-disclosure agreements (NDA) and Google management is doing its best to dispel these persistent rumors of a web-centric Linux-powered mobile phone.

Google and Apple have a fruitful partnership, as I mentioned on 21 June. But the mobile communications industry keeps growing, and Google needs new ways to increase its advertising revenue. The gPhone would provide a great opportunity to create a mobile advertising industry.

Google seems to building a platform that programmers can use to easily build mobile applications, with plenty of hooks into Google services like Gmail, Google Maps, and the Google Search engine.

If Google does open up this application programming interface (API) so that programmers can build true mobile applications that run on the gPhone and tap the Internet, it will be much easier for developers to distribute their gPhone software on the mobile Internet.

Compare this scenario with the Apple iPhone, which restricts developers to web-based mobile applications. Apple likes to lock down their hardware to keep it stable and secure. AT&T, like any sensible mobile carrier, wants to keep its network secure and free from rogue applications. It’s a classic walled garden.

The closed software model works for the iPod, but it remains to be seen if customers will tolerate a closed iPhone. Corporate customers want to add their own software to the iPhone, of course, but it’s so much easier when the API is open and available.

Google and Apple are each looking at the upcoming FCC auction for the analog television spectrum. Business Week speculated on their plans in this 10 September article. The winners of this auction would control a nice range of convenient, unused bandwidth in North America after television stations switch to HDTV transmission in early 2009. That spectrum is a great place to build a national mobile telecommunciations network that’s independent of the mobile phone carriers.

Given Apple’s closed model, it’s easy to guess that an Apple mobile network would feature Apple hardware, software and services, with Apple calling the shots on pricing.

Google, on the other hand, looks more likely to let multiple hardware vendors build compatible devices for the gPhone, and let software developers write the applications, as long as Google services are easy to bundle and use.

Building a new national mobile network would be an expensive proposition, especially as Sprint continues to plan its WiMax strategy. See this 28 August article and this 7 September article, both on Engadget, for more details. Clearwire, the current leader in WiMax deployment, continues with its national plans, as I described on 14 June. However, Clearwire stock took a beating Monday, as its joint work with Sprint hasn’t impressed investors yet, according to a 10 September report in Forbes. This 19 July Forbes article has some additional background on the Sprint-Clearwire national WiMax network.

WiMax makes sense for laptop users, because a laptop battery can deal with the radio modem’s power requirements.

Mobile phones need small batteries, however, and the analog television spectrum is an ideal place for residential wireless connectivity. If I were running a landline telephone company, I’d be worried.