Why are we so slow to adopt new technology, asks TheInquirer’s head mobile analyst Tony Dennis.

Dennis asked six leading operators for one. Not one will comply. The only place you’ll find a data-enabled SIM is buried inside a dongle or handset.

Why are they being such nervous Normans? “God knows,” complained one distributor.

One of the most positive responses came from Orange. The company confirmed it is possible to take an Orange Broadband SIM out of an Orange dongle and use it in an embedded PC. The company also pointed out it is actually offering an Eee PC with an embedded SIM.

3UK admitted to looking into offering SIMs for embedding as part of its mobile broadband (MBB) strategy, but says it sees the dongle as continuing to be the mainstay of the MBB market. Again, it did admit that if you took a SIM out of a dongle it would work.

However, Virgin Mobile wouldn't recommend subscribers take the SIM out of the dongle. It says they wouldn't get the benefit of the associated software. The INQ's not sure that's technically correct.

We can copy the software across because the dongle acts like a memory stick anyway. But then the INQ has unlocked the software on its Huawei E220.
If the INQ had picked the Advent 4211c instead of the Samsung NC 10, it would know the answer to this one.

T-Mobile says it offers mobile broadband pay monthly contracts as well as non-committal tariffs for 1, 7 and 30 days. It also pointed to an existing relationship with Sony to provide embedded SIMs for the latter's laptops.

Curiously, T-Mobile couldn't see why anyone would want to take the SIM out of the dongle in the first place. It's aesthetically pleasing, that's why.

Vodafone provided no direct answer but was very willing to discuss the subject at a later date. O2 just said it had no embedded SIM option and wasn't very helpful.

Yet a recent report from Disruptive Analysis entitled 'Embedded-3G laptops over-hyped' predicted that embedded will only account for 30 per cent of all mobile Broadband computing subscribers by 2011.

So isn't that a bit short sighted of the operators, pleads Tony Dennis.

Yes Tony, it probably is. What were you expecting?