LightSquared Might Lease Sprint Facilities

LightSquared is in discussions to use Sprint Nextel Corp.’s cell sites and equipment to help build out its network, Businessweek reports.

The deal would allow LightSquared to roll out its network more quickly and at lower cost, but also could have ramifications for Clearwire. At least in principle, Sprint itself could use LightSquared facilities for Long Term Evolution traffic, if Sprint decides to add LTE as an air interface in the future (perhaps it is a foregone conclusion that Sprint will formally launch an LTE network, beginning sometime later in 2011 or early 2012).

Sprint, Falcone’s LightSquared Said to Discuss Network Deal - Businessweek

Facebook Dominates Social Networking, Growth Slows

Facebook users in the United States seem to include more than half of all Internet users, measured by log-ins at least once a month, says eMarketer.

In 2011, 132.5 million U.S. web users will use the site monthly, eMarketer forecasts. That increase of 13.4 percent in the number of users means Facebook will reach nearly 90 percent of social network users and 57.1 percent of Internet users. By 2013, 62 percent of web users and almost half (47.6 percent) of the overall US population will be on Facebook.

But that very substantial penetration also means single-digit U.S. user growth in users after 2011.

Twitter will have higher growth rates, at least in part because relatively fewer online Americans use the microblogging service. By the end of 2010, 16.4 million U.S. adults, or nine percent of the adult Internet population, used Twitter. Growth will surpass 26 percent in 2011 as Twitter reaches 11 percent of Internet users and 16.5 percent of U.S. adult social network users. By 2013, nearly 28 million Americans will be tweeting.

Press Release - eMarketer

NEC Medias: Docomo To Offer The World’s Thinnest Smartphone

NEC Casio Mobile plans to introduce what is described as the thinnest phone in the world within weeks. The "Medias" device measures just 7.7 millimeters thick and weighs 105 grams. The Android device features a four-inch touchscreen, Gorilla Glass and Android 2.2, with an update to 2.3 promised for the summer of 2011. It will run on the Docomo network operated by NTT.

NEC Medias: Docomo To Offer The World’s Thinnest Smartphone

Unmet Enterprise "Mobility" Segments 42% of All Workers

Nobody seems to argue that enterprises are better off using all sorts of technology tools. But one might always get an argument about which tools various associated require. Consider the matter of company-issued mobile phones or smartphones, which have become a huge cost element for most enterprises.

Forrester Research estimates many enterprise IT managers are underestimating demand for mobility solutions, especially from two employee segments Forrester Research calls "mobile wannabes and mobile mavericks."

"Mobile wannabes" are employees not considered to be "mobile" workers who need mobile tools. "Mobile mavericks" are employees who use smartphones for work but without company support.

Combined, those two worker segments currently account for 22 percent of all employees; by 2015, they will grow significantly to 42 percent of all corporate employees.

Mobile wannabe workers can include executive assistants, human resource workers and customer service representatives, Forrester says. Mobile maverick employees buy their own smartphones and download their own productivity and communications apps to do their jobs on the go. Common apps include email, calendar and voice. About half use However, half of navigation applications and instant messaging services, and one quarter use social apps for some work-related purpose.

The Rise Of Wannabe And Maverick Mobile Workers - Forrester Research

Amazon's Prime Streaming Will Disrupt Netflix

Analysts tend to agree that Amazon has about 10 million "Prime" members. Of those, it is estimated that 60 percent are paying members. If that's true, Amazon brings in $474M a year in revenue from Prime subscriptions, says Dan Rayburn.

If Amazon could add five million paying Prime members this year, they would generate nearly a billion dollars in revenue from about 10 million Prime members. There's your revenue stream.

Amazon's Prime Streaming Will DEFINITELY Disrupt Netflix

Mobile Phones and Your Brain

A good reason to use speakerphone when you can, perhaps.

Amazon Gets into Video Streaming

Data Warehousing at Inflection Point?

This year, 2011, might be an inflection point for data warehousing, according to Gartner.

"In 2011, we are seeing data warehouse platforms evolve from an information store supporting traditional business intelligence (BI) platforms to a broader analytics infrastructure supporting operational analytics, corporate performance management and other new applications and uses, such as operational BI and performance management," said Donald Feinberg, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner.

Gartner Says Data Warehousing Reaching Its Most Significant Inflection Point Since Its Inception

Apple Cuts Minimum iAd Price

Apple's iAd platfrom started out with a $1 million minimum advertiser commitment. Now iAd campaigns can be bought for $500,000. One can argue the move makes iAd available to smaller advertisers or campaigns. One might also argue that the move suggests some resistance to the original prices.

Apple Halves Minimum iAd Buy

Mobile Banking Gets Investment

Hannes van Rensburg, the CEO of Fundamo, a South African firm that has built 50 mobile payment systems for operators in Uganda, Pakistan and others, says margins on mobile payment projects are much more attractive in emerging markets.

"In the U.S. and Europe, you have to compete with the established credit card system, which is already very efficient," he said. "There is more money to be made in emerging economies."

Analysis: Telcos battle tech, banking titans in mobile payment | Reuters

Android's Indirect Business Model

In just one year, Android's share of the smartphone operating system market rocketed to 30 percent from five percent in late 2009. But the whole business model is indirect, as Google gives away Android for use by mobile handset suppliers, some of which clearly have benefited.

Android has returned Motorola and Sony Ericsson back to profitability. it can be argued. HTC, an early proponent of Android, is now considered a major handset player in the United States as well.

Millennial Media reported that in Android continued to lead in mobile ad impressions after overtaking iOS in December of 2010. Millennial, whose ads reach approximately 80 percent of U.S. mobile web users, reported that Android's ad impression increased by eight percent to 54 percent in January while iOS dropped four percent to 28 percent and RIM fell two percent to 14 percent.

Android applications have doubled since August 2010 as well.

Google makes money on advertising and app sales based on the popularity of Android devices, but nothing directly from Android itself, which is an open source product at this point.

Android: Google's Secret Weapon - Seeking Alpha

Nokia will be Volatile, Analyst Says

RBS analyst Didier Scemama believes Nokia's stock price will drop to 5.80 Euros. In a “base case” scenario the Nokia of 2013 will have 11 percent of the smartphone market and the stock price will drop by 15 percent, says RBS analyst Didier Scemama.

In the worst case scenario those figures change to 6.4 percent smartphone market share and 53 percent of the stocks value disappears. If Nokia manages to do everything perfectly, which it almost never does, then the best case scenario is 15 percent smartphone market share and share price goes up 54 percent.

RBS: Nokia will own 6.4% of the smartphone market in 2013

Mobile Payments Price War

New moves by mobile payments provider Square suggest competition is heating up in the small business mobile payments space.

Intuit's GoPayment system charges 2.7 percent, plus 15 cents per transaction, while Square now charges 2.75 percent, but no per-transaction fee.

The moves suggest that small business mobile payments now has become a serious business, with serious competition for customers.

Price war beckons for mobile payments • The Register:

What is a Book?

Average physical book prices are going up, and average units sold are going down, at the same time that ebook reader ownership also is growing.

Having seen this before, just about all of us would conclude that a shift to new formats, business models and delivery channels is inevitable.

The future of the book - O'Reilly Radar