December 20, 2012

Smartphone owners became the majority of mobile phone users for the first time this year, growing from 49 percent of mobile subscribers in Q1 2012, to 56 percent by Q3 2012. Mobile app usage also continued to grow. Among the top 10 mobile apps, Twitter was the fastest growing Android app, and the Facebook Messenger app grew the most among iPhone apps.

Google remained the top Web brand, with an average 172 million unique visitors each month between January and October 2012, followed by Facebook, which garnered an average of 153 million visits each month. Online video continued to grow in 2012, but YouTube remained the top online video source, averaging 132 million unique viewers during the year.

Business Insider
Henry Blodget
Dec. 22, 2012

There has been a lot of talk over the past couple of years about how laptops and desktops are toast and everything’s going mobile.

As a result, the prevailing wisdom is that companies should become:

• “Mobile Only” (just forget big screens, keyboards, and mice–they’re dead)

Or, at least,

• “Mobile First” (design everything for smartphones first and big screens as an afterthought)

For some mobile-centric companies–Instagram, location-based apps, mobile games–these strategies obviously make sense. The applications the companies offer are centered on mobile gadgets.

For other companies, however–including some news and information companies that are frantically redesigning their businesses to focus on “Mobile First”–the strategy seems misguided.

The smarter strategy, I think, is this: (more…)

Business Insider
Alex Cocotas
Aug. 10, 2012

Business Insider Intelligence a new research and analysis service focused on mobile computing and the Internet. The product is currently in beta. For more information, and to sign up for a free 30-day trial, click here.
The share of online video plays on non-PC/Macs doubled last quarter. According to FreeWheel’s Q2 Video Monetization Report, non-desktop views now account for 8.2 percent of video view volume, comprising more than a billion videos views. Non-desktop views includes connected TVs, but given the enormous growth of tablet and smartphone sales, mobile is probably responsible for the bulk of the growth.

As we discussed in our mobile usage report, consumers are increasingly watching long-form content on their mobile devices. As a result, total video ads per video should increase on mobile devices, which has been the case in online video generally.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/mobile-video-surged-last-quarter-2012-8#ixzz2F4yayUJG

Daniel Ionescu
Dec 3, 2012

Samsung remained the most popular phone maker in the U.S. in the third quarter, but Apple is slowly closing in, the latest comScore MobiLens report finds.

PHONES: iphone, samsung, apple

With a couple of successful smartphones under its belt this year, such as the Galaxy S IIIand Galaxy Note II, Samsung ranked as the top smartphone manufacturer with more than 26 percent of the U.S. market, an increase of 0.7 percentage points.

Apple is still a distant second at 17.8 percent after a 1.5 percent increase, which helped the company outrank LG by 0.2 percentage points as the number two phone maker. LG dropped almost 1 percent in the three months ending in October 2012.

COMSCORE MOBILLENS

Motorola and HTC, number four with 11 percent and number five with 6 percent, haven also seen small declines in mobile share in the third quarter, compared to the three months to July 2012.

Android dominates

If you look at the mobile OS market share figures, you will also find that Android is dominating with 53.6 percent share after a 1.4 percent increase, but Apple is a closer second in this category, with a 34.3 percent share after a 0.9 percent increase this quarter. Meanwhile, Research In Motion’s BlackBerry retains 7.8 percent of the market and Microsoft Windows Phone had a slight decline, again, to 3.2 percent. (more…)

Mashable Business
November 15, 2012
by Seth Fiegerman

Consumers and businesses worldwide will make more than $1 trillion in purchases from mobile devices by 2017, as the technology enabling mobile payments becomes increasingly common, according to a new report from IDC Financial Insights, a market research firm.

IDC predicts that the vast majority of these payments will come from mobile commerce, which includes things like making purchases through a company’s mobile website. NFC payments will make up a significant chunk as well, as this technology comes to more smartphones and retailers upgrade to point-of-sale terminals.

“The growing prevalence of smartphones is enabling a variety of mobile payment methods, which combined are becoming a significant share of global commerce,” said Aaron McPherson, IDC’s practice director of worldwide payment strategies, in a statement. “We expect growth rates to continue to accelerate as consumers and retailers become more comfortable with the technology.”

While $1 trillion might sound like a lot, IDC points out that it’s still just 2.5% of the total global payments that could be processed through mobile devices by 2017 if the technology and demand were there.

Much of this, as IDC points out, depends on financial institutions, telecoms and retailers coordinating on standards for mobile payments going forward. If not, IDC says, mobile payments may grow at a slower rate in the coming years.

Images courtesy of iStockphoto, hakusan and IDC Financial Insights.

by Riddhi
posted: November 8, 2012

During the recent “Global Music Industry Overview” session at Radioandmusic.com’s Nokia MusicConnects 4 there was a panel discussion on the “New Music Ecosystem”. This panel discussion was moderated by Mobilium Global CEO Ralph Simon, which consisted of the likes of Hungama Digital Media Entertainment MD and CEO Neeraj Roy, Youtube APAC head of music Anthony Zameczkowski, Nokia Entertainment operations director James Bradbury, EMI Music India MD and CEO T Suresh and Fountainhead Promotions and Events chairman Brian Tellis.

The way musical content is delivered and consumed has undergone a drastic change over the past few years. Digital has become the premier medium fueled by the increased adoption of mobile and internet. If reports are to be believed 65 per cent of the Indian music business is digital now, and close to 12 billion micro transactions are made by 200 million consumers every year. (more…)