Video to Account for More than 60% of Total Mobile Network Traffic in 2011

Video became the dominant form of mobile data traffic in 2010, accounting for more than 40 percent of the total volume in wireless networks worldwide, according to Bytemobile. With the rise of full-length and studio-quality videos and live streaming of multimedia content on mobile devices, as well as the emergence of two-way video communications, Bytemobile expects mobile data traffic to spike to an all-time high in 2011, when video-based content will account for over 60 percent of network traffic.

Personal video communications will dominate wireless network capacity, such that 10 percent of subscribers consume 90 percent of total network traffic.

Bytemobile Forecasts Video to Account for More than 60% of Total Mobile Network Traffic in 2011

iPads Got 7% of Global PC Market Sales in Fourth Quarter

Apple reports selling 7.3 million iPads in the fourth quarter of 2010. Since the PC market represents something like 100 million units a quarter, one might infer that the iPad in the fourth quarter represented perhaps seven percent of total PC sales.

iPads Are Already 7% Of Global PC Market

Mobile Service Revenue in 2014: $870 Billion or More

Mobile services revenue will grow to $870 billion in 2014 based on mobile broadband and messaging, Infonetics Research now forecasts. Some think mobile revenues will be even more substantial, surpassing
$1 trillion and accounting for more than half of all global telecom service provider revenue. See http://ipcarrier.blogspot.com/2010/01/how-will-global-telecom-revenue-sources.html

Mobile broadband and mobile messaging service revenues are growing rapidly and will help operators offset declining voice revenues, says Stephane Teral, principal analyst.

but voice service isn’t going away anytime soon; in fact, voice will still account for almost 60% of the mobile pie in 2014. Operators need to continue selling smarter phones and upselling data plans to keep pace with falling voice usage,” says Stéphane Téral, Infonetics Research’s principal analyst for mobile and FMC infrastructure.

Mobile services to hit $870 billion in 2014

Modified Pay Wall Seems to Work, Study Finds

In a study with potential implications for many content-related businesses, a number of newspapers apparently found a hybrid "pay wall" model limited traffic losses (and therefore ad revenue losses) while still creating a differentiated "premium" service offering full access.

The newspapers in the test allowed a small number of "free" article reads each month, while also requiring a subscription for full access.

Journalism Online said monthly unique visits to the Web sites included in its study fell zero to seven percent, while page views fell zero to 20 percent. No publishers reported a decline in advertising revenue.

Unlike a strict pay wall, which requires a subscription to view almost all editorial content, a model like the one Journalism Online employed does not choke off huge amounts of Web traffic.

“If you set this meter conservatively, which we urge people to do, it’s a non event for 85, 90, 95 percent of the people who come to your Web site,” Mr. Brill said.

Journalism Online Examines Pay Model - NYTimes.com

Sprint Adds $10/Month Smartphone Device Fee

Sprint will increase its postpaid service plan rates by applying a $10 per month "premium data" add-on charge to activations of smartphones beginning Jan. 30, 2011. Existing Sprint smartphone customers are not affected unless they upgrade to or activate another smartphone.

Sprint had earlier levied the fee for the HTC EVO, a move some called a tax for using the fourth-generation network, something Sprint would not have agreed was the most accurate way to describe the plan. Instead, Sprint positioned the charge as specific to the Sprint 4G EVO. "This is specific to the device," said

It's not related to whether you are using 3G or 4G. "It is required if you have the phone," said John Taylor, who works with Sprint. See http://tech.johntaylor.co/more-detail-on-the-sprint-evo-4g-10month-prem.

Of course, in addition to the argument that the charge was specific to the EVO, the new logic now extends to all smartphones, in large part because smartphone users consume more data.

You might wonder why Sprint did not simply increase its data plan rates. There are a couple of logical reasons. The surcharge allows the nominal data plan rates to remain unchanged, while still generating $10 per plan more revenue.

One might argue that the way the increase is billed also maintains a "simple pricing" position Sprint believes is important. Many will argue a simple $10 a month, across the board increase in mobile plans also is "simple," though.

The bottom line is that Sprint believes it must raise prices to generate the cash needed to continue funding its mobile broadband network's expansion. You can agree or disagree with that point of view, but all observers note that bandwidth demand is outstripping revenue, for virtually every mobile service provider.

Long term, especially if the mainstay revenue sources are declining, that is incompatible with continued survival, much less continuous investment in more network capability.

Smartphones Drive Wireless Data Explosion

Smartphone Data Consumption Climbs 100% to 350%

The median smart phone user data consumption has increased from 40 MBytes per month to 137 MBytes a month, an increase of 350 percent. The 80th percentile user is using twice as much data as a year ago.

(Click image for larger view)

At the same time, smartphone ownership has roughly doubled in the same time period. So you are looking at a four- to seven-fold increase is data usage.

As a general rule, one could rightly conclude that truly "unlimited" service plans cannot be offered at low prices in such an environment. There is of course an obvious model for users who require such plans: higher prices more akin to business plans.

The data tsunami, and why Sprint increased its data charges - FierceWireless

How PayPal Quickly Gets into Mobile Payments in a Big Way

With a $10 billion market cap, Discover Financial Services is ridiculously undervalued, says consultant Philip J. Philliou. "$10 billion is barely fair value for the card portfolio and yet, it is the network that makes DFS most attractive," says Philliou. "My wildcard bet is that PayPal acquires DFS."

In the scenario, PayPal rebrands everything Discover and uses the Discover Network to penetrate the $6 trillion in store spend opportunity in the United States.

2011 Prediction: Discover Financial Services acquired by year end

Data Centers are the New Wrinkle for Capacity Firms

Executive Interview: Bill Barney, CEO, Pacnet from ptctv on Vimeo.
Pacnet CEO Bill Barney talks about what's going on in the capacity business, especially changes wrought by video, hosted apps and cloud computing.

The Six Big Global Service Provider Challenges

Executive Interview: Scott Puopolo, Vice President, Global Service Provider Practice, IBSG, Cisco from ptctv on Vimeo.

HTC EVO 4G $99 on Amazon

The HTC EVO 4G, which sells for $199.99 from Sprint, is now available for a bargain $99.99 when purchased through Amazon.com, with a service plan. It is available in both black and white color schemes.

buy here at Amazon

Apple iPhone 5 Will Be "Completely Redesigned"

The Apple iPhone 5 will be a completely redesigned handset, says Engadget. That's just the sort of thing that can refresh the whole installed base of devices. Possibly due as early as the summer of 2011, the looming prospect of a completely-redesigned iPhone is likely to start causing users to wait on buying an iPhone 4.

That might be of special concern for Verizon Wireless, which just began selling the iPhone 4.

The future of the iPhone 5

Amazon Will Control Android App Store Pricing

Amazon.com's new Android App Store is interesting for a couple of reasons. It would be a new and potentially influential independent app store, with huge brand name recognition.

Amazon at least potentially could play a role in curating mobile applications in way slightly different from what Apple has been doing at its own app store. Apple approves all apps. Amazon will do so as well, but says it will retain the right to determine the selling price for a paid app. That is consistent with Amazon's policies for other key products, such as Kindle e-books.

But that policy would be different from the model prevailing at most other app stores, especially the Android and iPhone stores.

It's hard to know in advance what impact such policies might have, but Amazon is an experienced retailer intent on applying sales knowledge to mobile apps as well. There is bound to be some friction, with some developers, over the control of retail pricing. On the other hand, Amazon and Apple have found good success with other products able to establish a consumer expectation of prici

Whether that can be done with applications of many types remains to be seen, but Amazon's approach will be instructive.

AMAZON Will Set The Prices For Paid Apps In Its Android App Store

Mobile Allows Marketing to Shoppers at Every Touchpoint

While in-store digital technologies and media will play a significant role, mobile is the linchpin for next-generation shopper marketing, eMarketer argues.

Location-based check-ins and in-store mobile are starting to become significant for both retailers and brand marketers. And in the post-shop phase brands and retailers should find creative ways to encourage shoppers to share their stories on social media.

Marketing to Shoppers at Every Touchpoint - eMarketer

iPhone Owners Use QR Codes More than Android Owners

Apple iPhone owners used quick response codes three times more often than owners of Android devices by nearly three to one, according to a recent analysis by JumpScan, a QR service provider.

The trend is based on a recent sampling of 5,000 scans from mobile devices. Blackberry came in a distant third, generating approximately three percent of the overall scans.

“One of the reasons,” speculates JumpScan co-founder Mike McKearin, “could be that iPhone users had a significant jump start on mobile web, apps and emerging technologies. “We anticipate this gap closing as Android users quickly adapt to QR usage on the mobile web.

iPhone Trumps Android in QR Code Scanning Battle

Apple Can Handle Ops Without Jobs; Innovation is the Issue

There is bound to be some market reaction from the news that Steve Jobs, Apple CEO, is taking medical leave. But the issues have more to do with vision, and the ability to create brand new markets, than actual operations at Apple. Apple's team seems well able to execute on its vision.

In the third quarter of 2010 Apple had four-percent unit share of smartphone sales, 22 percent sales value share and 50 percent of profit share. In part, that is because it has honed its manufacturing processes, some would say.

Few CEOs have created markets the way Jobs has. And that's the danger the financial markets will be trying to assess, not Apple's operations.

Last quarter Apple obtained 4% unit share, 22% sales value share and 50% of profit share | asymco

HTC Tops Other Android Handset Suppliers for Upgrades to Latest Version

HTC seems to be the most-prolific handset manufacturer in terms of introducing Android operating system upgrades, according to a study conducted by Computerworld. HTC upgraded 50 percent of its Android phones to to Froyo, the latest Android version, within 2010. Its average upgrade time is 56 days.

Motorola comes in second for number of upgrades, with 15.4 percent of its Android phones having tasted Froyo before the end of 2010. While that number sounds low, especially compared to HTC, note that Motorola had four handsets that weren't released until November 2010, which means those devices had far less time on the market before the year's end.

Android upgrades: Which manufacturers can you trust? - Computerworld

Apple CEO Steve Jobs Goes on Medical Leave

Steve Jobs, Apple CEO is taking medical leave at Apple. Jobs says he will continue as CEO and be involved in major strategic decisions for the company, as apparently he has in the passt.

Tim Cook will be responsible for all of Apple’s day to day operations during the absence, as happened also when Jobs took his last leave.

At few companies is the potential departure of a CEO as crucial as at Apple, but it probably is worth noting that Apple has, in the past, continued to introduce major products of high market impact even when Jobs was not physically as present.

The iPad, another apparent breakthrough product, was launched after Jobs had a liver transplant.

Apple Media Advisory | Business Wire

Mobile Works Better than Online Advertising, Study Finds

InsightExpress, a digital marketing research firm, found mobile campaign norms were 4.5 to 5 times higher than online norms against measures of unaided awareness, aided awareness, ad awareness, message association, brand favorability and purchase intent.

A comparison of three different mobile media types (Mobile Internet, SMS and Mobile video) revealed that mobile Internet is the current powerhouse. Mobile Internet campaigns resulted in increases of nine percentage points for unaided awareness, nine percentage points for aided awareness and 24 percentage points for ad awareness. SMS is also effective at increasing upper level purchase funnel metrics such as awareness measures. SMS campaigns generated increases of 5 percentage points for unaided awareness, 10 percentage points for aided awareness and 18 percentage points for ad awareness.

Mobile video is still emerging, but shows campaign impact on par with SMS across most key brand metrics. This channel drove especially strong results against brand favorability. With an increase of 13 percentage points, compared to 12 percentage points for Mobile Internet and 7 percentage points for SMS, mobile video is demonstrating promise as a way to move the important brand favorability measure.

Comparing mobile norms to online norms, mobile consumer packaged goods purchase intent effect is three times higher than online CPG purchase intent. Mobile entertainment purchase intent effect is four times higher than online entertainment intent.

Mobile travel purchase Intent effect is five times higher than online travel purchase intent, while mobile technology purchase intent effect is seven times higher than online technology purchase intent.

Mobile automotive purchase intent effect is four times higher than online.

read more here

Small Business Marketing Looks to Rise in 2011

Small business owners plan to spend on marketing their business in 2011, according to a new survey by Manta, the world's largest online community for promoting and connecting small business.

Some 77 percent of small business owners surveyed by Manta plan to spend in 2011 even though 85 percent reported across-the-board cuts in 2010. Some 47 percent have prioritized marketing and sales as their top spend, with 24 percent noting business development as top priority and 23 percent opting for marketing and advertising.

Another 23 percent of the respondents said they couldn't prioritize expenditures for 2011, given the current state of their business.

Manta Small Business Survey: Marketing a Priority in 2011

U.S. Hispanics are Avid Mobile Users

U.S. Hispanics are avid mobile phone users, according to Scarborough Research, which finds that the percentage of Hispanic adults who use a cellular phone grew 26 percent since 2005, versus 18 percent for all adults. Currently, mobile usage among Hispanics is on par with that of the general population as 82 percent of Hispanic adults use a cellular phone, compared to 84 percent of total adults.

But Hispanics are heavier users. Hispanics are more likely than other cellular users to text message. Sixty‐four percent of Hispanics who use a wireless phone text message, versus 56 percent of all cellular users.

Also, 22 percent of Hispanic cellular users download or listen to music using their wireless device, compared to 15 percent of all wireless users. Likewise, 19 percent of Hispanic cellular users play games on their wireless device, compared to 15 percent of all wireless users.

Some 12 percent of Hispanic cellular users access social networks from their wireless device, compared to 10 percent of all wireless users.

Additionally, the Hispanic smartphone growth rate is outpacing that of the total population. Nineteen percent of Hispanic adults currently live in a household that owns one or more smartphones, up from five percent in 2005. Twenty‐three percent of the general population currently owns these devices in their household, growing from nine percent in 2005.

read more here