Affluent Asia-Pacific Mobile Users are Heavy Mobile App, Skype Users

Over the top VoIP services such as Skype are a major draw for users around the world who need to make cross-border calls, for obvious reasons. And users in China, Malaysia, Indonesia and India are no different. While much Skype usage originates and terminates on PCs, mobile usage of Skype seems might be quite prevalent as well, in those four countries.

Some 44 percent of surveyed mobile consumers with mobile Internet in Malaysia use over the top VoIP services, as do 38 percent of respondents in India, with 69 percent of VoIP-using respondents saying they use Skype, Analysys Mason says.

It isn't clear whether that refers to any use of Skype or other over the top calling apps, or the percentage who use mobile VoIP. In fact, it seems rather doubtful that mobile VoIP constitutes "most" of the Skype usage in those countries.

Much could depend on whether those relatively affluent consumers responding to the Analysys mason poll are akin to "early adopters" with behavior patterns quite different from those of mainstream users.

The impact of over-the-top (OTT) communications services, such as WhatsApp Messenger and Viber, is growing, but used unevenly.

About 11 percent of smart phone owners use mobile VoIP applications regularly, compared with only five percent of mobile users as a whole. 

Usage of over-the-top services [Source: Analysys Mason Connected Consumer Survey 2012

1 Various questions; Denmark, France, Germany, Poland, Spain, the UK and the USA; n = 7485.

Of 107 million mobile VoIP users expected by 2012, more than half will reside in North America and Europe, owing to the fact that 3G, which is required for mobile VoIP to be effective, has been rolled out in those regions, according to Juniper Research.

But Juniper Research also agrees that the Far East and China will account for most of the remaining mobile VoIP growth, followed by the rest of Asia-Pacific.



 Africa and the Middle East, the Indian subcontinent, and Latin America will round out the remaining growth, with roughly equal percentages, Juniper has predicted. 

“Affluent” consumers in emerging Asia–Pacific countries spend 48 percent more time using communications  and media services than those in Europe and the United States, a study by , Analysys Mason suggests. On average, survey respondents with Internet connectivity in major emerging APAC markets spent 13  hours a day using telecoms and media services, compared with 8.8 hours for consumers in Europe and the United States.

The Analysys Mason conclusions were drawn from an online survey of 4,000 consumers 18 and older in China, India, Indonesia and Malaysia.

The caveat is that the survey sample arguably over-selected for “relatively affluent” consumers, Analysys Mason notes.

On average,  total exposure to telecom and media apps and services was highest in Malaysia (14.6 hours each day), followed by Indonesia (14.2), India (13.3) and China (9.9).



The survey also found that usage of mobile content and apps was high among connected consumers, which is probably no surprise. In China some 78 percent of respondents used mobile apps, while and 79 percent of respondents in India said they use mobile apps.

More than 56 percent of survey respondents used a smart phone.

About 11 percent of respondents that buy both fixed and mobile broadband services are planning to give up their fixed broadband service, but that is balanced by13 percent of respondents that have only mobile broadband who report they are considering also buying fixed broadband.

Starbucks Adds Square for Mobile Payments

In a move that in one sense shows the scale of Starbucks mobile payments operations, and might ultimately suggest other opportunities, Starbucks is outsourcing its mobile payment operation to Square. 

Users will simply use the Pay with Square app in place of the current app. At least so far, the advantage for Starbucks might be more tactical than strategic. Some think Starbucks will get better rates on each payment, than it had been able to do using its prior in-house method.

Others might suggest that the cost of supporting the mobile payment operations has grown to the point where outsourcing that particular function makes more sense than doing it in house. 

Basically, the Pay with Square app will be used by Starbucks in a "stripped down" version, allowing users to display a Square bar code that works with the existing Starbucks bar code scanners. 

Starbucks has said nothing about using the Square credit card dongles, or changing out its current point of sale infrastructure. 

In similar fashion, many of the full Square analytics features will not be used, since Starbucks seems comfortable with its own analytics. 

But the move does suggest Starbucks sees some future upside to using Square. What isn't clear is whether that is a tactical decision, such as often made by firms when they switch from an in-house or proprietary application to a "standards-based" alternative, or something more. 

Apple, Samsung, Android Still the Story in Second Quarter 2012

Apple, Samsung and Android remain the story in the global smart phone business in the second quarter of 2012, according to IDC.

In the second quarter, Android had 68 percent market share. All other operating systems lost 15 percent market share, compared to the second quarter of 2011. 

The IDC figures also show Research in Motion's market share decline from an 11.5 percent share in 2011  to 4.8 percent over the last 12 months, Symbian dropping from 16.9 per cent to 4.4 percent.




Smartphone OS World market shares Q2 2012 and 2011

Tablets Indirectly Threaten HP's Business Model

Tablets are not a direct cause of HP's strategic disarray. PCs and the consumer hardware business arguably are the problem, clashing with HP's ability to become a pure-play enterprise services supplier. 

But tablets represent both a threat to the PC revenues and a device that relies on the cloud services that HP might alternatively focus upon. The problem remains that HP is a firm with conflicting pressures and interests. 

HP is still the biggest maker of PCs in the world – excluding tablets – but Steven Milunovich at UBS Investment Research reckons the tech giant should get rid of its PC hardware business and focus on services related to cloud computing and business products. 

Of course, that course has been at least temporarily rejected. Former CEO Leo Apotheker proposed doing so and was dumped. New CEO Meg Whitman reversed course. And now Milunovich essentially argues Apotheker was right. 

Doing two things stops HP doing either well, he argues: "HP lacks the pure enterprise focus of IBM and EMC yet will have trouble competing for consumers without strong tablet and phone businesses like Apple and Samsung," 

So, indirectly, tablets represent the latest twist in the rather lengthy story of HP vacillating about its strategy. Without a robust tablet and smart phone business, the consumer business looks vulnerable, longer term. But since the PC and printer business is about half of HP, the continual debate about remaining in the consumer and enterprise businesses 
is tough to resolve. 

U.S. Mobile Business Now is Unstable

There are growing signs that the U.S. mobile service provider market is unstable, in terms of market structure, and on the cusp of changes that could include a significant wave of provider restructuring, despite the failure of the AT&T bid to buy T-Mobile USA. 

"What is clear for now, in our view, is that the current strategy, indeed the entire current business, isn't working," said Craig Moffett, an analyst at Sanford C. Bernstein. Moffett seems to be referring to the whole business operated by regional U.S. wireless carriers. 

To be sure, Moffett has been saying that the U.S. mobile business is saturated since at least 2009. 

Oddly enough, to some of us the new stresses resemble the earlier transition from dial-up Internet access to broadband access. In this case, the transition is from feature phone to smart phone business models. 

In that earlier transition, many suppliers that had made a business of supplying dial-up access found they no longer could compete in the broadband business. Now, in mobile, it appears that the cost of supporting handset subsidies is pinching operating revenue, while the cost of building fourth generation networks likewise will hit earnings. 

Of the "big four" U.S. mobile carriers, only T-Mobile USA seems to have experienced a subscriber loss. 

In its second quarter of 2012, AT&T added 1.5 million net new customers. Verizon Wireless added 1.2 million net new subscribers. Sprint added postpaid net additions of 442,000 postpaid net additions. But T-Mobile USA, one the "big four" U.S. mobile service providers, lost 510,000 subscribers in the first quarter. 

The immediate stress is heavy for the regional mobile providers, often using prepaid models. 

Regional or prepaid service providers clearly have had a tougher 2012 than had been the case in the mid-2000s, for example. Leap hasn't been profitable since 2005, for example. MetroPCS profits dropped 63 percent during the first quarter of 2012.

A study undertaken by Tellabs suggests that mobile service provider profitability could become extremely challenging for some mobile operators within three years, with costs surpass revenues for many operators.

In North America that could happen by the fourth quarter of 2013 or as early as Q1 2013. Developed Asia Pacific service providers could see problems by the third quarter of 2014. In some cases this could happen as early as Q3 2013, Tellabs said. 

Service providers in Western Europe could run into trouble by the first quarter of 2015. In some cases this could happen as early as the first quarter of 2014.

Photo of Mars Rover "Curiosity" Heat Shield Dropping Away

Here's a shot of Mars Rover Curiosity dropping its heat shield on the Martian descent. Also, lots of dusty brown rocks, eh?

M2M Mobile Connections: 2.5 Billion by 2020

Mobile network machine to machine (M2M} connections will grow from 277 million in 2012 to 2.5 billion by 2020, growing at a 30 percent compound annual growth rate between now and 2020, according to Strategy Analytics.

Health, meter reading, energy management and transportation applications are expected to lead the growth.