How Can Cloud Services Best be Sold?

If we are indeed moving towards an era of computing where "cloud" is the dominant architecture, you have to ask how such services will be sold to enterprises, small business and consumers. You might logically conclude that cloud-based services will be sold in much the same way current products are sold to each of those market segments.

That is to say, enterprise sales often are sold by direct sales forces; small businesses are served by channel partners and consumers mostly are reached using online and mass media channels. The new wrinkles are that cloud services have a logical relationship to mobile devices, mobile apps and online provisioning, compared to older services and business applications.

"So far, no one that I am aware of has found a way of selling cloud services around the channel in any volume to SMBs without an army of out-bound telesales or field sales people of their own," argues Dale Vile, CEO of Freeform Dynamics. It’s hard to achieve serious scale that way, and without scale, the cloud model doesn’t work well economically."

'Backward' resellers impede cloud progress. Yeah, right • Channel Register

Sprint Reduces Clearwire Voting Stake

On June 1, 2011, Sprint Nextel Corporation notified Clearwire Corporation of its decision to voluntarily surrender Class B voting shares in Clearwire, to reduce its voting interest in Clearwire from approximately 54 percent to approximately 49.8 percent.

Sprint retains its 54 percent ownership of Clearwire, but the voluntarily reduction of voting shares protects Sprint in case Clearwire declares bankruptcy.

The latest move by Sprint illustrates the odd nature of the relationship an strategy, the ultimate wisdom of which is something it will take some years to assess with any certainty. One can argue in retrospect that pooling Sprint's spectrum with Clearwire's assets to create the expanded company was a rational effort to achieve a several year lead in fourth generation services. One also can argue that the move, which ceded managerial control even as Sprint gained 54 percent of the ownership rights, was a mistake.

One can argue it was a reasonable effort to steal a lead in the 4G market, which now looks to be less significant only because the strategy provided only about a two-year lead, and less than that in strategic terms, given the early choice of WiMAX as the air interface, given the rest of the industry's selection of Long Term Evolution as the 4G air interface.

Hindsight is perfect, of course.

http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1442505/000095012311057433/v59385e8vk.htm

"'Pretty Good" Year forBroadband Plan

Blair Levin, former executive director of the FCC's National Broadband Plan, says that it has been a "pretty good year" for the plan. Spectrum allocations, Universal Service Fund reform and rights-of-way reform are the key areas where work remains to be done.

Levin said he thought the debate had gone "off track" on the spectrum reform issue. He said the issue to resolve is not whether to reallocate spectrum, but how to reallocate it on an ongoing basis to serve evolving needs.

Asked whether broadcasters are sitting on underutilized capital, he said some are and some aren't, but that the market should determine whether, post cable and Internet, there was still a need for 25 or 30 TV stations in New York. For the 25th broadcaster in New York, it may be more valuable to sell the spectrum, he suggested.

The thing about big policy proposals and plans is that any changes are going to help some industry segments and firms, and hurt some segments and firms. The National Broadband Plan isn't different in that regard. Firms and industries that reckon they will be harmed will fight, vociferously against the changes.

Levin: 'Pretty Good' Year forBroadband Plan

Cloud Computing Creeps into Enterprise

As has been the trend recently, end users are bringing new technology to their workplaces, and cloud services seem to be the most-recent new developments. About 20 percent of 573 C-level executives in 18 countries say they have personally purchased a cloud service without the IT department’s knowledge.

While 60 percent of companies report they have policies in place that prohibit such actions,
respondents say there are no real deterrents for purchasing cloud services by stealth. In fact, 29 percent report there are no ramifications whatsoever while another 48 percent say it is little more than a warning.

The survey also shows private cloud deployments are growing, especially where critical, differentiating internal operations and customer services are at stake. Today, 43 percent of companies report they use private cloud services, while an additional 34 percent say they will begin to do so in the next six to 12 months.

The survey, conducted by Kelton Research on behalf of Avenade, also shows that 74 percent of companies are using some form of cloud services today, a 25 percent growth in adoption since Avanade’s September 2009 survey.

Facebook is Big, Statistically

Content Is Currency

In explaining why content marketing is important, I have in the past argued that all buyers these days, both in their roles as consumers and buyers of business products, routinely search online for information when they've decided they need to buy something to solve a problem they have.

The issue for suppliers is that such buying processes start before any supplier's selling process can begin. If that is the case, suppliers need to be visible and credible during the research process, when buyers are making decisions that will eliminate most solutions and suppliers.

But there is another angle: people are very busy, and must contend with a very-chaotic and rich media environment. In other words, people now are bombarded incessantly with messages, making it harder to get attention.

Content becomes the conduit to earn consumer attention, the currency, if you will, that creates the marketer's side of the value exchange, argues Jason Heller at MediaPost.

MediaPost Publications Content Is Currency - How Wealthy Is Your Brand?

Netflix is the Big Story for Online Streaming in 2011

Among the consumers who participated in the most recent CBS Vision research, 43 percent are now Netflix users. A year earlier, Netflix users were such a small percentage of respondents that CBS grouped it into the "other" category, says CBS Chief Research Officer David Poltrack.

Turning to the streaming of full-length TV programs, as opposed to movies, Poltrack said that Netflix has now almost caught up to Hulu.

The latest survey suggests that users are not too interested in getting Internet access from their TVs, at least among households that subscribe to multi-channel digital TV services and also buy broadband access.

One might hypothesize that widespread use of Wi-Fi, connected smart phones, tablets and notebooks have something to do with those new findings. It doesn't add much value to access the Internet from the TV screen if you have a tablet or smart phone or notebook or netbook handy that can do so.

MediaPost Publications Netflix, iPad Lead Streaming TV Rally

A New Way to Measure "Sharing"

 AddThis has launched a new way for publishers to track the sharing that happens in its simplest form, namely copying and pasting a URL from the address bar and then sharing it out to a social network, email or instant message.

For AddThis, which is owned by Clearspring, that could represent a huge new trove of data that the company can provide to web publishers.

Clearspring CEO Hooman Radfar says that the company has “seen up to 10 times greater sharing from the address bar versus the sharing buttons.”

With a network that now reaches more than 1.2 billion unique users per month across 9 million sites, that’s a ton of sharing that had previously been going uncounted.

Measurement tools of that sort are important for media properties, as what used to be called "pass along readership" can allow publishers to claim bigger audiences, which then allows higher advertising rates.

Read more here

Despite 4G, 3G is Where the Growth Is

WCDMA HSPA connections will reach 500 million worldwide by the end of June, making it the fastest-growing wireless technology ever, according to new Wireless Intelligence data. Furthermore, LTE, the next-generation mobile broadband technology, has now reached one million connections only a year and a half after the first commercial network launches.

The rate of WCDMA HSPA adoption in its first six years is ten times greater than the take up of GSM mobile phones when they were first introduced in the mid-1990s, says the firm. 

There are now more than 19 million HSPA connections being added each month and it is predicted that the industry will reach 1 billion HSPA connections by the end of 2012. LTE networks are also being rapidly introduced, with 1 million connections already and 300 million expected by 2015.

http://www.mobilebusinessbriefing.com/article/hspa-based-mobile-broadband-connections-set-to-pass-500m

Play a Game, Win a Prize: One Take on Mobile Advertising

Kiip: An Introduction from kiip on Vimeo.
Mobile advertising often does not take advantage of the unique attributes of the medium, ranging from availability of a camera to the touch interface. But lots of thinking is going into how games can be used as an advertising or promotions medium. A "play a game, win a prize" approach is one way to approach it.

How Small Businesses Use Mobile

Perhaps surprisingly, navigation and GPS are the most-used mobile apps.

Most TV Available Online, Mobile in 2 Years

Executives from Disney, Turner, and Comcast were in unanimous agreement that we are only two years away from 75 percent of TV content being available online and on mobile devices. As with many other applications, services or features, one has to avoid attributing unstated adjectives. "Online" or "mobile" does not mean "free" or "at no incremental cost." That's a mistake often made when terms such as "peering" or "dumb pipe" are discussed. There is no reason to assume that "peering" means "settlement-free," or that "dumb pipe" necessarily is preced by the adjectives "low gross revenue, low margin or commodity."

At the Elevate Video Advertising Summit, Matt Strauss from Comcast Interactive Media, Jeremy Legg from Turner, and David Preshlack of Disney and ESPN predicted that TV "everywhere" was imminent, and that in the same time frame the networks will be almost completely agnostic about where and when their video content is being viewed.

"For us, in the broader context of what we’re doing, we’re beginning to migrate everything to Internet video," said Strauss.

The business issues will be key. Content owners are not going to give away mobile or online access without being compensated. Distributors will try to minimize the additional rights payments. But consumers likely will have to pay, one way or the other. Such payments might happen directly, as in an incremental fee when buying other linear services, or as a new fee for online-only or mobile-only access.

In other cases the additional payments might be made indirectly, as in the case of bigger broadband access buckets of use that accommodate the extra video consumption. The point is that universal access will involve new payments to content providers, which will mean costs passed on to consumers.

The payments might be more of an incremental issue if the new distribution rights require prior, "tied" purchases to cable TV, satellite or telco TV subscriptions. Payments will be larger for "online only" or "mobile only" subscriptions not tied to purchase of other products. But the new attitude on the part of major content owners means something will happen.

Television Executives Predict Bulk of TV Content Will Be Available Online and Via Mobile Within 2 Years

Mobile Payments Conference Call for Speakers

I'm soliciting speakers for the Mobile Payments Conference to be held Sept. 8 and 9, 2011 in New York. 


We anticipate session content including:
* retailer programs
* mobile wallet services and platforms
* mobile payment approaches
* terminal and device choices
* payment ecosystems
* business and revenue models


If you want to speak, or suggest a firm or speaker you'd like to hear, please ping me. 

The second Mobile Payments Conference will grow to feature a fuller look at wallet business models and transaction models, with additional attention to retailer strategies that have become more public, as well as a deeper look at the retail terminal perspective, now that some leaders now will strive to achieve a critical mass of users.

As we did at the last conference, we will use a highly-collaborative setting designed for maximum participant conversation. In part, that means using an approach very akin to a graduate seminar. We keep presentations short, and, since most attendees are subject matter experts in some part of the ecosystem, we structure the physical setting and time allocations to maximize conversations, as would be expected in a seminar setting.

Contact Gary Kim at garykim.denver@gmail.com  to participate or recommend speakers and topics. Contact Marla Ellerman at marla@mmtmagonline.com for information on sponsorships and exhibits. 

Apple Plans New "Spaceship" Campus

Apple wants to build a new headquarters, and "It looks like a spaceship just landed there,' says Steve Jobs, Apple CEO.

It's one giant circular building that would hold 12,000 people.

Apple: The Company's Plan For A Gorgeous New Campus

Apple To Start Releasing New iPhones And iPads Every 6 Months?

Apple is going to accelerate its iPhone and iPad release schedule to two upgrades a year to better compete with the onslaught of competitors, says Adnaan Ahmad of Berenberg Bank.

Ahmad also thinks Apple will soon release a 'cheap' iPhone priced in the $300 range (before subsidies) to fight off cheaper competition. At that rate, a subsidized device could sell for $50 to $100.

Apple's Going To Start Releasing New iPhones And iPads Every 6 Months To Compete With Android