Motorola Will Create 7-Inch and 10-Inch Tablets

Motorola co-CEO Sanjay Jha says Motorola Mobility will definitely participate in the tablet space, but it will continue to focus the bulk of its efforts on smartphones. The company will release both 7-inch and 10-inch tablets in the near future, and it views both product ranges as being “quite meaningful.”

Motorola will focus on software differentiation with its tablets, targeting the enterprise, international and retail market places.

Where smartphones are concerned, Motorola will continue to focus on top-tier and mid-tier devices — mid-tier devices have sold in greater volume internationally, while top-tier phones found success in the U.S. market.

Jha says Motorola Mobility "will have 4G devices in the marketplace early next year." Jha didn't say "Verizon Wireless" specificially, but most observers think that is what he meant.

read more here

Clearwire to Issue $1.1 Billion in New Debt

Clearwire Communications says it plans to issue new debt of more than $1.1 billion. That's about a fourth of what some analysts think the company will have to raise to complete its national network. The debt issuance does not mean equity investments might not also occur later, as some $3 billion in additional funding might be required, ultimately.

Some of those observers believe the $1.1 billion is enough to get Clearwire through 2011.

Clearwire Corp - News Room

Lots of Segments to Target in Communications

As part of an exercise to compare bundles of services purchased by consumers in various countries, Ofcom, the U.K. communications regulator, identified a number of distinct segments in the communications market.

(Click on the image for a larger view)

Ofcom then compared bundles of services that correspond to each segment. The interesting notion here is that, looking at nothing other than types of services and amount of usage, Ofcom identified a number of different segments in the consumer market.

These charts show how just a single service--mobility--maps to the basic segments.

If one were to consider age, lifestyle and attitudes, one could conceivably come up with a far-larger number of niches and segments in the market. In practice, smaller competitors normally are required to identify such customer segments if they are to compete with larger contestants. That's why some companies emphasize prepaid wireless, Hispanic customers, immigrant communities, videogame players, teenagers, multi-location businesses or small businesses.

U.S. Internet Advertising Now Bigger than Outdoor, Radio, Magazines

Structural changes in advertising have led to a considerable redistribution of advertising spend between media and channels, a new study by Ofcom, the U.K. communications regulator, suggests.

Internet advertising now represented just under 15 percent of total advertising expenditure in 2009, compared to just over four percent in 2004.

In the United States, Internet advertising already had climbed to 17 percent of total by 2009, while in the United Kingdom, Internet advertising represented about 27 percent of total.

One way of looking at it is that U.S. Internet advertising already has surpassed outdoor, radio and magazine advertising. Internet advertising relatively soon will pass newspaper advertising to take the number-two spot, behind only television advertising in revenue.

By contrast, print advertising has been hit particularly hard, with spend on newspaper and magazine advertising experiencing the greatest proportional declines over the period, collectively accounting for a third of total expenditure in 2009 compared to 44 percent in 2004.

Are Skippable Ads Better?

Google is giving video viewers on YouTube the opportunity to skip pre-roll advertising. After a video viewer has been shown five seconds of an pre-roll advertisement, they will be given the option of skipping past it, at least in the U.S. and Canadian markets, for the time being.

While this format may seem counterintuitive to decades of advertising practice, view-through rates (where users watch the entire ad) are still between 20 percent and 70 percent.

A significant benefit of the new "TrueView Ads" format is that it is a cost-per-view model, so advertisers are only charged if an ad is viewed in full, or for at least 30 seconds.

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Google in Talks to Buy Groupon

In a big move that would make Google a significant player local advertising, Google is in talks to buy local deals site Groupon, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Groupon's board of directors reportedly will meet by conference call Wednesday to decide how to proceed. The possible offer price 'is a big number,'' the Wall Street Journal reports.

Groupon specializes in coupon and other deals that are intended to drive consumers to local merchants. With Groupon, Google would also pick up contact information for about 12 million consumers. Groupon collects credit card information from users, as well as data it uses to personalize its offers, such as their neighborhoods and the kinds of businesses they have bought web coupons from in the past.

Google in Talks to Buy Groupon - WSJ.com (subscription required)

Women Prefer iPhones, Men Androids

Women planning to get a smartphone are more likely to want an iPhone as their next device, with slightly more males preferring Android.

U.S. Smartphone Battle Heats Up: Which is the “Most Desired” Operating System? | Nielsen Wire

Don’t Just Build An App. Build A Mobile Business

App developers need to understand that there’s more to a successful app than just a good product and a launch. Having a solid product is a great starting point but it’s precisely that — a starting point.

To cultivate success, you need to develop a business plan, think through marketing, distribution, monetization, and plan for the evolution of the product itself months down the road. If you want to succeed, you need to understand that you aren’t just building an app; you’re building a business on mobile.

Don’t Just Build An App. Build A Mobile Business

Is Social Media Over-Hyped?

1 Example of Mobile Enabling a New Business, Or At Least a New Sales Channel

A nurse in the aiport offering vaccinations and flu shots. You might have seen them recently.

Some of them seem to be using Apple iPads equipped with a "Square" attachment to collect payment with a credit card.

Mobile Enables New Businesses

Verizon Has Won the Marketing War for High-End HTC Devices

People ask me what device I'm using, and neither "HTC" or "Evo" rings any bells. If I just say "Droid," they seem to know what it is.

That's winning.

Verizon Wireless Lights 38 Cities for LTE

Verizon Wireless 4G LTE will be available in 38 cities on Sunday, Dec. 5, 2010. Cities include:

Akron, Ohio
Athens, Georgia
Atlanta, Georgia
Baltimore, Maryland
Boston, Massachusetts
Charlotte, North Carolina
Chicago, Illinois
Cincinnati, Ohio
Cleveland, Ohio
Columbus, Ohio
Dallas-Ft. Worth Metroplex, Dallas, Texas
Denver, Colorado
Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
Houston, Texas
Jacksonville, Florida
Las Vegas, Nevada
Los Angeles, California
Miami, Florida
Minneapolis/Saint Paul, Minnesota
Nashville, Tennessee
New Orleans, Louisiana
New York, New York
Oakland, California
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Orlando, Florida
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Phoenix, Arizona
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Rochester, New York
San Antonio, Texas
San Diego, California
San Francisco, California
San Jose, California
Seattle/Tacoma, Washington
St. Louis, Missouri
Tampa, Florida
Washington, D.C.
West Lafayette, Indiana
West Palm Beach, Florida

Verizon Wireless Launches The World’s Largest 4G LTE Wireless Network On Dec. 5

4G Debate is Meaningless, Clearwire Says

The debate going on about who is or isn’t 4G is unimportant because whether it’s called 3G, 4G, WiMAX, LTE, or HSPA, all that matters, in the end, is getting a great price on a fast connection with a ton of included usage, Clearwire says.

Purists won't agree, but users don't care. There are good reasons for standards, but standards bodies are only one way "standards" get set. Sometimes the market sets the standards

The Chicken Soup Debate CLEAR Blog

Collaboration Will Become More People-centric in 2011

Collaboration used to be more a matter of sharing documents. Recently, collaboration has changed to become more people-centric. 'Need to know' becomes 'need to share'. The change can be illustrated by growing use of social networks and video collaboration, for example.

Collaboration Will Become More People-centric in 2011

Are Apps Overrated?

A new study, commissioned by promotion and experiential agency Moosylvania, found that the majority (80 percent) of smartphone users surveyed used apps. But of the 300,000 or so apps on the market only about a handful dominate.

While 30 apps were reported as the norm, most mobile users (85 percent of men and 75 percent of women) actually used only about 10 apps on a regular basis. This could be discouraging news for marketers, since an app only can work if it gets used, and works better if it gets used by lots of people.

Free helps too. Some 44 percent of app users said that all, or nearly all, of their apps were free.

Are Apps Overrated