How has the ecosystem evolved with the daily habits of mobile Internet users?

How has the ecosystem evolved with the daily habits of mobile Internet users? The journey from the PC Internet to the current age of the Smart device Internet is charting an exciting path on how the market ecosystem is evolving with the daily habits of mobile Internet users of today ... 

In the last 20 years, we have witnessed 4 Phases in the Journey to the Mobile Internet. From the age of the "PC Internet" to the "Feature Phone Internet", "Smartphone Internet" and now the "Smart device Internet".  We have also seen how users of the Internet have evolved in their daily habits of information and content consumption - this is evident as we review the market development in the five pillars in the digital content Internet business. 

How has the evolution been in the ecosystem during the 4 phases in our journey to the mobile Internet?

(1) Content has grown richer in variety and depth

• From black and white to colour and having depth in colour in graphics (remember days of black and white operator logos, picture messages in Nokia feature phones)
• From mono tone ring tones to polymorphic ring tones to MP3s and today's streaming and high-def music services
• From simple flash and java games to today's rich app store games and multi-player social games
• and the list goes on ... video, TV, 3D, augmented reality characters and so on ... consumers are spoilt for choice

(2) Advertising has evolved across multiple screen sizes, devices, content and purpose

• Ads are no longer restricted to the TV (broadcast, content and ads in DVDs) and PCs (with multimedia cards allowing for TV, video playing, radio listening).
• Ads are now also seen in various apps (e.g. chat, youtube); and apps are now in Smart TVs.
• Ads are evolving as content for the brands - attempt from brands to engage audiences.

(3) Access to Internet and content is widely availed to a global audience

• Content is now availed through TVs, radio, PCs, laptops, feature phones, smartphones, tablets, phablets, wearables, and so on in all manner of smart mobile devices - one of the trends in recent years and into 2013 ... 
• Feature phones are also getting smarter and driving mobile Internet access and innovative content consumption, especially in the emerging markets where mobile phones outnumber PCs.

(4) Payment for content (and now products) and the players in the ecosystem are fast evolving to cater to consumers' lifestyles and daily habits

• No longer restricted to just credit cards and PayPal,
• Operator mobile billing via sms, money online payment methods like bank transfers, scratch cards, COD (cash-on-delivery) are offering alternative payment modes for not only digital contents but potentially also for physical products and merchandise.

(5) Fulfilment, the last mile in terms of delivery of products and content and personalised bundled offers is being invested 

• Besides Amazon who leads the pack in this area, China's Alibaba and local ecommerce players like Redmart are investing in owning logistics fulfilment to ensure continual customer satisfaction and retention.

How are digital content players working to shape daily habits of mobile Internet users?

• News is sticky - look at Yahoo, local news sites like Malaysia's Malaysiakini.com, Indonesia's Detik.com and you will see them feature in the top 20 Alexa rankings for the local markets. And as for apps for news ... new ways to read news online are constantly evolving in their offers.

• Communication - mobile instant messaging (social chat), private chat, mobile Internet call (Skype), or good ol' email, is a hotly contested space in the market today, globally and especially more so in Asia.

• During Echelon June 2013 Asia startups event in Singapore, a number of players I met with are focusing on apps which cater to the following daily habits of users - take a look at the slideshare showcase below.

Echelon June 2013 Singapore - showcase of mobile apps and startups to daily habits of mobile Internet users by Nelson Wee from Nelson Wee

Consumers are growing spoilt for choice for content, products and mobile devices and appliances from where they can consume content and buy products from. With more choice fighting for a growing yet at the same limited attention span of the consumers, lots of innovation and change in the ecosystem will be taking place in this current age of "smart device Internet" and future ages to come - this indeed spells out for more exciting moments to come to see how the daily habits of the mobile Internet users will continue to evolve.

For your reference, please see below for the rest of the presentation deck which I presented my "Journey into the Mobile of the Internet" recently on 19 June 2013 at Salesforce.com Biz Academy (I would like to thank Sultan Semlali for this wonderful opportunity). Appreciate your comments.

Journey into the mobile of the Internet - Nelson Wee Salesforce.com Biz Academy Presentation 19 june 2013 from Nelson Wee

I look forward to continue with my conversations with you.

Talk soon~
Nelson Wee
Profile: Nelson Wee, Singapore
Blog: http://myovi.blogspot.com
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.com/nelsonwee 
Twitter: @nelsonwee

6 Reasons WHY Feature Phones need some loving too (Building reach for digital content via feature phones)

"Think about feature phones, they need some loving too ... " I heard this over presentations by Digi and AIS in the 2010 AppXchange Asia event. Granted 3 years have elapsed since the event and all the spotlight these days are given to impressive numbers of smartphones and tablets replacing feature phone users, there are strong reasons for us to think about feature phones and why they need some loving.

(1) Market for feature phones still overwhelm smartphones today

• According to Mary Meeker's Internet Trends 3 Dec 2012 report, whilst there were 1 billion smartphone users globally, that pales in comparison to the 5 billion total mobile phone users worldwide - that's still 4 billion feature phone users worldwide today!
• In emerging markets like Southeast Asia, where the Internet is largely and increasingly experienced via mobile, smartphone penetration is less than 25% on average. 
• Indonesia with its population of 250 million, more than 150 million unique subscribers, has only about 10% smartphone penetration - so, go figure~

(2) Innovation in Mobile Internet Services had existed with feature phones, way before smartphones

• Remember Japan's I-Mode which was a huge success case study in the late 90s to early 2000s?
• In South Korea, even with feature phones then, there were a number of successful case studies and innovation with the likes of mobile loyalty point system OKCashBag, mobile gift voucher system Gifticon from SK Telecom (now SK planet runs this; disclosure: I am now at SK planet).
• It is the developer ecosystems and digital content value chain partners which have been driving the mobile internet service innovation in the era before smartphones, with feature phones (albeit smart as they were already then).

(3) My First Internet, My First Email in emerging markets happened with Nokia (Ovi) feature phones

• Nokia Ovi services which was launched 28 August 2008 (disclosure: I was managing the Nokia Ovi services for Southeast Asia then), provided a number of emerging markets globally with their first Internet, and first email experience.
• A suite of mobile internet services - contents and calendars sync, photo and video sharing, files sync across PC and mobile, maps and navigation, mobile music, mobile social gaming and mobile apps downloads (sound familiar?) were made available already in those earlier years, to users of Nokia feature and Symbian phones (in those days, the N-series (with Maps, Mobile TV services etc), E-series (Push email, mobile device management and PIM sync services) as well as the iconic Nokia Communicator were the smartphones).
• Nokia Life Tools, a sms-based information subscription service for the emerging markets (China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria etc), with more than 95 million users to date, has provided agricultural, educational, healthcare and entertainment service offerings to Nokia feature phone users.

(4) eBooks are thriving and growing with feature phones

• In China, people have already been reading ebooks on their mobile phones and now increasingly on low-cost tablets (more than 75% feature phones - Mary Meeker's Dec 2012 Internet Trends report) with a market size of about $90 million (PwC data). Anecdotally, this figure could well be worth more than $300 million, given China consumers subscribe to ebook stories on sms and mms packages on their mobile - given more than 75% are feature phone users - Mary Meeker's Dec 2012 Internet Trends report).

(5) Social chat messaging is also gaining support and growing via feature phones

• Nimbuzz who has 120 million users today, largely in India and Middle East, is expanding into Singapore, Indonesia and other Southeast Asia markets with its social chat supporting feature phones and smartphones, through partnerships with mobile operators.
• NHN Japan is partnering with Nokia to push their Naver Line social chat service to the next 200 million in 2013, via Nokia's best selling Asha feature phones line-up.

(6) Cloud will enable "smart" feature phones

• biNu is Your Smartphone in the Cloud cloud-based software platform that delivers popular internet services and digital content fast and with low bandwidth for an efficient mobile experience to both feature and smartphones. It is backed by Google Chairman Eric Schmidt's TomorrowVentures.
• In fact, through biNu, romance publisher Harlequin (refer to first demo video below) and Worldreader (refer to second video below) will be offering eBooks through cloud-based eBook reader apps on feature phones who are now made "smart" by the biNu efficient cloud-based service platform. 

Well, 2 more areas to look out at for feature phones are in mobile social gaming with Migg33 (huge in Indonesia, South Africa etc) and mobile advertising (Buzzcity).

Are you convinced yet on the why feature phones today still need some loving attention if businesses are looking to grow and expand their mobile internet business globally?


Let's engage,
Nelson Wee
LinkedIn Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/nelsonwee
Slideshare: http://www.slideshare.com/nelsonwee
Twitter: @nelsonwee

Photo credit: vernieman / Foter.com / CC BY

5 Key App Insights from AppsXchange Asia 2010 Event in Singapore

The recent AppsXchange Asia event in Singapore on 16-17 June 2010 brought together the entire Apps Eco-system in Asia together -mobile phone manufacturers (Nokia, Samsung), operators (Telenor Group, Digi, Maxis, Singtel, AIS), content developers (mbounce, Zing Mobile, Touch Dimensions etc), mobile ads providers (Buzzcity, Mobile Spinach), platform solutions and payment providers (Oracle, Volantis, Globys, PayPal).

Here are the 5 key app insights gleaned from this 2-day discussion and networking forum around the Go-To-Market programs for Apps and the roles Operators and players could play in.

(1) With APPolution, Application Discovery is a Key Concern

• In an earlier post "3 social News Apps for a Nokia Phone", I wrote referred to the increasing number of apps offered by media publishers in the many apps stores available today.
• Arnie Chaudhari, Vice President, Sales and Business Development, mBounce, highlighted that with APPolution (i.e. app evolution), the applications marketplace is becoming increasingly crowded.
• Praveen Rajan, Head of Mobile Internet, Digi, talked about working with partners from other apps stores to push recommendations of apps via various operator online, mobile and offline channels. One case study he shared was around promoting daily content discovery through SMS subscriptions to Youtube alerts

(2) Traffic and Downloads are going off-deck

• Simon Wong, Sales Consulting Director, Oracle, highlighted that 50% to 80% of apps are now downloaded off-deck (note: Juniper Research)
• Praveen Rajan from Digi also advised that from experience, that operators need to rethink the Operator WAP Portal.  He suggested simplifying the operator wap portal with key promotional messages like attractive data plans, value-added service packages, or contests involving apps.

(3) Operators are trusted brands and offer value in platform enablers and to partner

• In his address on "Developing converged apps for TV, mobile and online", Naveen Wathan, Head of Product Innovations, Product Development and Infotainment, Maxis, saud that the role of the of the network operator is to enable applications across different user interfaces (TV, Mobile, Online) - use the Cloud, develop easy to use APIs for developers & co-market.
• Tanis Kuneepong, Partner VAS Marketing Manager, AIS (Thailand's largest operator) ahso shared about SingTel's regional apps store program, which is scaling up through shared apps sourcing, shared in -apps ads inventory, shared VAS offers across the Singtel group.
• Dr. Calicrates Policroniades, Senior Researcher/Business Developer in Content and Applications, Telenor Group Corporate Development, highlighted that the Telenor group's strategy is to focus on providing platform enablers to apps developers, rather than building their own apps stores.

(4) Operators offer value in consumer insights and marketing

• Praveen, Digi had started the event saying that "Everyone has favourites" (apps for that matter) and there are many opportunities for operators to promote apps, value-added services (VAS) and data plans to their consumers. Think about how to sell VAS the Apps Store way.
• Duanne Edwards, co-founder and Senior Vice President of Product Development, Globys, stated that operators can win the apps race by enabling discovery, profiling their consumers and understanding occasions - i.e. segment apps by occasions of usage, thereby driving downloads for developers through marketing contextually relevant apps to consumers.
• Urvashi Sahay, Director, Mobile Services and Integration, Singtel, reiterated support in providing more transparency to developers from Operators. Singtel for example is committed to sharing consumer insights to developers - what are the opportunities and in which verticals should developers be work on.

(5) Think about Feature Phones - they need some loving too

• Tanis Kuneepong, AIS, shared that out that 7 of the top 20 top performing phones for their AIS Apps Store (launched 8-FEB 2010) were Nokia feature phones.
• Arnie Chaudhuri from mBounce, Urvashi Sahay from Singtel, Dr. Lai Kok Fung from Buzzcity reminded the forum to think about the needs of the emerging markets which were largely proliferated with feature phones rather than smartphones. These consumers are looking for mobile ads with value, apps with sms-based content, utility apps for their feature phones.
• 2 examples of apps stores supporting feature phones are GetJar and the Nokia Ovi Store (which support more than 100 models of feature phones and smartphones today).

As seen by the 5 apps insights from the AppsXchange Asia event,

• In Asia, where there are both developed and emerging markets,
• where there are both smartphones and feature phones co-existing,
• there are different needs of consumers which could be catered to by the apps eco-system players - operators, content developers, mobile phone manufacturers, solution providers etc. 

I am very excited to be part of this dynamic and exhilarating apps growth market here in Asia.  How are your experiences in the apps market space?  Any best practices, case studies or key issues to share?  I look forward to hearing from you.




best regards,
Nelson Wee
or tweet me at @nelsonwee