IP Carrier

Amazon Kindle Fire is Having Quite an Impact

2012-01-27T15:01:00.003-07:00

The Amazon Kindle Fire is having quite an impact on end user sessions. In just two months, the Kindle Fire has gone from zero sessions to 36 percent of all Android tablet sessions.

On the chart you can see that the Samsung Galaxy Tab dominated Android tablet application sessions as recently as November 2011.

Just two months later, In January 2012, Kindle Fire represented 36 percent of sessions, the same percentage as held by the Galaxy Tab.

Other data suggests that tablet and e-reader ownership doubled in just two months, as well. Unprecedented growth

The share of adults in the United States who own a tablet of some sort nearly doubled from 10 percent to 19 percent between mid-December 2011 and early January 2012.

The ownership of e-readers also surged from 10 percent to 19 percent over the same time period. Tablet ownership doubled in two months

That is an unprecedented growth rate for any consumer electronics device. Tablet ownership also had been on a strong adoption path earlier in 2011 as well, but doubling in 30 days from a base of 10 percent seems never to have occurred before.

Mobile Banking, For Many, IS banking

2012-01-27T14:45:00.001-07:00

Mobile banking is becoming banking, a PwC survey suggests. Mobile banking will be the norm by 2015 and consumers will be willing to pay up to $15 per month for mobile banking services that offer convenience and value.

Key to the PwC research is its prediction that by 2015 mobile will overtake branch networks as the dominant channel of customer interaction with financial institutions.

Another finding is that the bar is getting raised: to attract Gen Y customers, financial institutions need to improve their digital banking products.

The PwC research is based on a survey of 3,000 customers globally.

“The research reveals that customers are willing to pay for social media notifications, an electronic wallet for loyalty cards and financial tools provided by banks," says PwC.

Siri Getting Used?

2012-01-27T14:38:00.001-07:00

Tell the truth: do you really do anything with Siri other than show people what a cool thing it is?

Maybe I'm hanging around with the wrong people, but I rarely encounter anybody who really uses it, other than to show somebody what it can do.

It's entertain ing, and provides a "wow" factor, but really, who uses it?

Google Mobile Wallet Facing Headwinds?

2012-01-27T14:32:00.000-07:00

Google’s head of consumer payments Vikas Gupta has resigned, AllThingsD reports.

Separately, former vice president Stephanie Tilenius also has left to work in another position at Google.

To be sure, it would not be unusual if an entrepreneur whose firm was acquired by Google eventually left to perhaps start another company.

Nor would it be unusual if an executive gets moved to another post, at a firm as large as Google.

But some will wonder whether the changes mean Google has found it more difficult than originally expected to get traction for its Google Wallet initiative.

And, as part of that, Bedier will be taking on a larger role within Google Wallet, though his title will not be changing.

Gupta joined the Google about 18 months ago after Google acquired Jambool, a virtual goods payment platform where he was a founder and CEO.

Osama Bedier, Google’s VP of Payments appears to be assuming the leadership role for the Google Wallet effort. Nothing is easy where mobile payments and wallet efforts are concerned, it seems.
Nor should we expect a smooth, linear growth pattern. In fact, the normal expectation is for overheated expectations, followed by a period of disillusionment, before actual mass adoption begins.

Mobile payments and mobile wallet expectations likely are approaching a peak of inflated early optimism. The "crash" of expectations surely will follow, before the business actually materializes in robust form.

more Evidence That Texting is Displacing Talking

2012-01-27T14:18:00.002-07:00

The latest data from CTIA: The Wireless Association provides more evidence that texting is displacing talking among U.S. consumers.

Since about June 2008 some 60 million additional users have become mobile subscribers.

Since that time, though, the amount of voice traffic has been flat. Usage has shifted dramatically to texting, rather than talking.

That doesn't mean a mobile device is useful "only" as a messaging device. People still do talk.

It's just that a greater percentage of total communications are occurring in text mode.

Latest CTIA data

Online Ads To Beat Print Spend For First Time

2012-01-27T07:58:00.000-07:00

Online advertising will will exceed print spending in 2012 for the first time, eMarketer now predicts.

U.S. online ad spending will grow by 23.3 percent in 2012, eMarketer projects, to $39.5 billion. It expects print advertising to reach $33.8 billion in sales, down from $36 billion in 2011. The shift has been a long time coming, and represents a key watershed for the media business.

Where a rational observer might have argued that online was a subsidiary medium, with print being primary, the crossover point now has been reached. One might now argue that online media are primary, and print is secondary.

At least in part, though, the shift is powered by growing digital revenues for former print publishers. Newspapers in 2012 will continue to be a bright spot.

Researchers at eMarketer forecast that digital ad revenues for newspapers will grow 11.4 percent to $3.7 billion, after rising 8.3 percent to $3.3 billion last year.

At the same time, print advertising revenues at newspapers will fall percent to $19.4 billion in 2012, after dipping 9.3 percent to $20.7 billion last year.

Google Has a Vested Interest in "Speed"

2012-01-27T06:14:00.001-07:00

Though low latency, faster access networks often are seen primarily as an access provider issue, Google has a direct financial interest in the fastest-possible degree of end user Internet access, which would explain Google's experiments with, and support for, faster broadband access, ranging from municipal Wi-Fi to white spaces to fiber to the home.

It is more than a subjective matter of "better end user experience." Faster access, and lower latency, mean users can view more pages and content in a shorter amount of time. For a company that makes its money from advertising, that means a potential increase in the number of impressions.

Now Google appears to be testing ways to reduce page load time by 10 percent to 40 percent by changing the way the Transmission Control Protocol operates.TCP is a key protocol used by all users of the Internet, and all web pages.

Google also appears to be working on methods for speeding up error correction methods, which would likewise speed up end user experience and delivery of pages.

Google also is said to be developing algorithms to improve experience on “noisy mobile networks” by reducing latency. Google working on faster web experiences.:

Apple, Samsung Earn 81% of All Mobile Phone Profits

2012-01-27T05:57:00.000-07:00

Profitability, more than anything else, now is shaping the global smart phone business, one might argue after considering the latest estimate by Strategy Analytics of market share in the global handset business.

Globally, Apple and Samsung have, over the last 12 months, surged to the top of the charts in terms of smart phone sales volume. In the past, the “smart phone” category has not been significant, as all devices were feature phones or basic phones.

As the market begins to shift to a smart phone buyer pattern, differences in firm strategy and execution have lead to a rapid change in market leadership.

Global smart phone shipments grew 54 percent annually to reach a record 155 million units in the fourth quarter of 2011, according to Alex Spektor, Strategy Analytics associate director. That apparently has proven to be a decisive change.

In the past, Nokia has been the global share leader, but Nokia has not been able to translate that prior success into smart phone success, where Apple has changed the game and Samsung apparently has been able to keep pace.

Apple overtook Samsung to become the world’s largest smartphone vendor by volume with 24 percent market share. Apple’s global smartphone shipments surged 128 percent annually to 37.0 million units, as distribution of the iPhone family expanded across numerous countries, dozens of operators and multiple price points.”

Apple took the top spot for share on a quarterly basis, but Samsung became the market leader in annual terms for the first time with 20 percent global share during 2011. With global smartphone shipments nearing half a billion units in 2011, Samsung is now well positioned alongside Apple in a two-horse race at the forefront of one of the world’s largest and most valuable consumer electronics markets, Strategy Analytics says.

In contrast, Nokia’s smart phone market share was cut in half from 2011 to 2011, dropping from 33 percent in 2010 to 16 percent in 2011.

That is one reason there has been so much focus on the Nokia partnership with Microsoft, as many would argue the Windows Mobile operating system represents the best shot Nokia will have to avoid collapse.

The other observation of note would be that profitability might now be emerging as the key differentiator, even though design and consumer demand clearly are driving the market overall.

Samsung’s most-recent quarterly earnings also set records. Samsung Electronics Co declared $4.7 billion in quarterly operating profit. jumping 76 percent year over year.

Between them, Apple and Samsung earned fully 81 percent of all profits in the mobile handset business.

Apple in the fourth quarter of 2011 shipped 37 million smart phones worldwide, up 117 percent from 17 million in the second quarter. This represented the strongest sequential quarterly growth among the top-five smart phone brands, according to IHS ISuppli.

“Samsung advanced in 2011 because of its strategy of offering a complete line of smartphone products, spanning a variety of price points, features and operating systems,” says Wayne Lam, IHS senior analyst.

On the other hand, the market share battle between Apple and Samsung reflects the competition between the two leading smartphone operating systems and ecosystems: Apple's iOS and Google's Android, says Lam.

“The relatively small growth of Sony Ericsson and Motorola may indicate that the Android smart phone market is becoming too crowded as the various licensees compete for limited consumer mind share and shelf space,” Lam says.

User Experience on PCs, Tablets, Smart Phones: Huge Latency Issues

2012-01-26T17:07:00.001-07:00

Latency is getting to be a bigger deal for mobile user experience. Apps that load quickly on a PC take much longer to load on a smart phone or tablet, Yankee Group reports, using Keynote Systems data.

Also, according to Yankee Group analyst Carl Howe, typical users now carry as many as five different mobile devices. But each of those devices might be optimized in different ways, in terms of latency.

Load times among sites differ because in most cases, content owners are not customizing the content they deliver to the device, says Howe. The majority of the sites Keynote Systems monitored, including major online brands Craigslist and Apple, sent the same content to smart phones and tablets, for example.

Facebook, Bing, Kayak, MSN, Amazon and IMDB all sent significantly more objects and bytes to tablets than to smart phones. These sites detected the larger screens of tablets and sent them more information, says Howe.

The one company that behaves significantly differently is Google, which sent roughly 450 KBytes to smart phones while sending only about 200 KBytes to tablets.

Google chooses to add several location-based options such as “Restaurants” and “Coffee” to smart phone content but doesn’t serve up those features to tablet users, probably because many tablets don’t offer location services by default. As a result, smart phones receive more content from Google than tablets do.

Those findings are interesting for several reasons. Since different devices feature different screen sizes and input and output capabilities, get used in different ways, at different locations, at different times of day, customizing the experience makes sense.

But tailoring a user experience based on what device is used, when it used or where it is used is not so different from tailoring an experience based on what application a user wants to engage with. And that’s where legitimate concerns about unfair business advantage bump up against end user preferences.

When a user wants to watch a video, conduct a video call or play an interactive game, issues such as latency and consistency of bandwidth availability are important performance parameters.

The policy issue is whether users or service providers ought to be able to manage network experience to enhance end user experience. For such reasons, some think “best effort only” access is not optimal.

Microsoft to Pay AT&T Employees to Sell Windows Devices

2012-01-26T15:08:00.002-07:00

Microsoft apparently plans to pay AT&T staff $10 to $15 for each Windows Phone handset sold as a direct result of a recommendation to a customer. It isn't illegal. Lots of products get promotional support of one sort or another.

Subsidies Verizon Wireless is paying to entice consumers to buy Apple iPhones might also be penalizing Android devices, some now argue. Though top Android devices cost as much as Apple iPhones, high-end Android devices often sell for prices $100 to $200 higher than the iPhone.

In other words, Verizon is trying to recoup some of its cash flow and operating margin by making Android handset users pay more for their devices than Apple iPhone users.

Verizon is betting that buyers who want the high-end Android phones will pay, so they're marking those models up.

John Hodulik, an analyst at UBS AG has estimated that the iPhone subsidy could be as high as $400 per iPhone customer. If 13 million of the devices get sold in a year that implies a which $5.2 billion hit to earnings. Some argue that devices should not be subsidized, since doing so means consumers have to sign contracts. But iPhone subsidies are quite a big expense for firms such as Verizon Wireless.

From at least one perspective, contracts and subsidies offer value for consumers and service providers, with users getting devices they want at $400 lower prices, while service providers can smooth out recurring service revenues and reduce customer churn.

Apple has set a standard entry price of its newest smartphones at $199, with higher end models available with more storage. This year however, Verizon has set a new contract price for its high end Android phones at $299.

The implications are clear enough. If you like high-end Android devices, do not buy them from Verizon.

Both the Motorola Droid RAZR and the just released Google-branded Samsung Galaxy Nexus are $299 with a two year Verizon contract, and both are listed as costing $649 without a contract.

In contrast, Apple's 16GB iPhone 4S is offered for only $199, even though it costs the same $649 without a contact. Apple is getting a $450 subsidy, compared to just $350 for Android licensees Motorola and Samsung.

Verizon's $199 Android phones, including the Samsung Droid Charge, Motorola Droid 3 and Droid Bionic, cost $499, $459 and $589 respectively without a contract, making their subsidies worth just $300 to $390, or $150 to $60 lower than Apple's, one might note.

The closest Verizon's phones currently come to an iPhone subsidy appears to be the HTC Thunderbolt, which is being offered for $149, a $420 subsidy compared to its $569 full retail price. However, this involves a special promotional discount of $100, making the "sale" price of Android models still higher than regular price of any of Verizon's iPhones. Verizon Wireless can do what it wants, of course. But consumers should also do what they want.

Apple Makes Enterprise Inroads

2012-01-26T14:55:00.001-07:00

Some 21 percent of surveyed enterprise information workers are using one or more Apple products for work, Forrester Research says.

Almost half of enterprises (1000 employees or more) are issuing Macs to at least some employees and they plan a 52 percent increase in the number of Macs they issue in 2012.

Managers and executives are more than twice as likely to use Apple products, suggesting an adoption pattern where the ability to use the device is something of a “perquisite,” much as at one time the ability to use a BlackBerry was a perquisite for enterprise executives.

But younger information workers (IT staffs for example) are twice as likely to use Apple products as older ones.

Higher income workers are more likely to use Apple products as well, but there is a “younger worker” issue here. Most of the sample of 10,000 global information workers earns less than $50,000 a year, but the adoption rate of Apple products is almost 17 percent even in the bottom quartile of workers who make less than $12,000 per year.

Keep in mind, also, that the survey was global in scope, and Information workers in countries outside North America and Europe were more likely to use Apple products for work. Annual salaries also might tend to be lower in non-European and North American settings.

Wi-Fi Offload Causing Price Hikes?

2012-01-26T10:49:00.000-07:00

Wireless service providers have been encouraging users to switch their mobile connections to Wi-Fi networks, when they can, as a way of managing their mobile data plans, and to improve user experience.

As it turns out, users have been heeding that advice to such a degree that AT&T now is raising mobile broadband prices and data caps, to encourage users to rely more on their mobile connections.

The ironic results show the unpredictable effects of operator policies intended to preserve user experience. Wi-Fi alleviates congestion on mobile networks. But Wi-Fi also is a substitute form of access, and AT&T now seems to be signaling that it wants to recapture more of the revenue-generating value of mobile access.

"AT&T said at a recent conference that they are seeing customers walk up to the edge of their tier and then use a lot of Wi-Fi to stay below the tier," Jefferies & Company Inc. equity analyst Thomas Seitz says.

Something similar can be noted elsewhere. Utility or water consumers often are encouraged to "use only what you need," in part to forestall the need to build expensive new generation facilities, dams and so forth.

But as consumers in Denver have found, because they reduced their use of water so much, Denver Water has had to raise rates, to cover fixed costs as revenue (water consumption is the revenue model) has decreased, precisely because conscientious consumers are behaving in a conservation mode.

Something quite similar might be happening in the mobile space. Mobile service providers globally have a vested interest in higher usage of broadband features, since that creates new revenue streams. But the desire to alleviate congestion by offloading traffic to Wi-Fi, also siphons off some usage that might otherwise be monetized by users who buy more-expensive access plans.

Offloading mobile broadband access to Wi-Fi might "help" consumers manage their consumption, as it helps operators alleviate congestion. But such measures can backfire, AT&T seems to be saying.

Users Unclear About 4G Value

2012-01-26T10:38:00.001-07:00

As you might expect, early adopters have clearer expectations about new technology, or at least want to "play" with new technologies, in a way that mainstream consumers do not share.

A recent study by Analysys Mason suggests that is the case for potential smart phone customers.

Many are not sure why they ought to buy and use smart phones, nor are they clear about why "fourth generation" networks have value.

More than six percent of all surveyed
mobile users believe that they lready have a 4G handset, which is obviously not yet true.

More than half of them do not understand mobile network generations or are unsure of the connectivity generation of their phone. The study also suggests that about 28 percent of
iPhone users believe that they have a 4G-capable handset.

Some 46 percent of iPhone 4 users also believe they already have 4G devices, even though no iPhones currently support 4G Long Term Evolution or WiMAX connections.

Also, except for PC dongle users, for whom the clear advantage is speed, and, in some cases, improved latency performance, the specific advantages of 4G are unclear.

That state of affairs is not unusual for broadband networks. Up to this point, the main advantage between one generation of broadband and the next is "speed." People instinctively understand "faster."

But 3G mobile networks did not lead immediately to significantly new uptake of new applications, until quite recently, when, for most users, 3G has meant a better web browsing experience. So far, it is not clear that most users can perceive the advantage of a "better" mobile web experience using 4G, as opposed to 3G, with the salient exception of mobile PC users.

AT&T, Verizon Results: Mobile Grows, Fixed Line Shrinks

2012-01-26T10:21:00.002-07:00

It is not news, nor unexpected, that AT&T's traditional wireline business, and Verizon's similar business, are contracting, while mobile is leading growth at both firms.

Revenue for the AT&T fixed network business fell to $14.9 billion from $15.1 billion, year over year. AT&T, Verizon fixed line business contracts

Verizon encountered the same pattern in its most recent quarter. Wireless generated $18 billion worth of revenue, and wired services about $10 billion.

Operating revenue grew in mobile, but declined in fixed line. Basically, all the new FiOS revenue is simply compensating for losses in other legacy services, including voice services and digital subscriber lines.

In the fourth quarter 2011, Verizon Wireless delivered the highest number of retail net additions in three years and strong growth in revenues, driven by increased smartphone penetration andincreased retail postpaid ARPU (average monthly service revenue per user). Fixed line revenues decline

Total wireless revenues grew 13 percent year over year while data revenues grew 19 percent year over year.

Orange will not Match Competitor Prices: Why That Is Smart

2012-01-26T10:17:00.001-07:00

France Telecom says it will not match the low-cost mobile offers recently launched by Iliad because such aggressive pricing would be bad for network quality and innovation in the long-run, says France Telecom CEO Stephane Richard. That Orange won't compete on price might strike you as unwise.

Goldman Sachs, for example, forecasts that Iliad's market entry will cause France Telecom to lose a third of its operating profits in its domestic market by 2015. That will obviously encourage thinking about the retail positioning of Orange's (France Telecom) pricing strategies.

Some will argue that Orange has to meet competitor prices. But others will argue that losing share is the wiser strategy.

There are ample precedents for France Telecom to do so, even though the strategy carries risks.

Beyond higher marketing costs as competition escalates, sometimes all an incumbent can do is harvest a business. That, in fact, was AT&T’s strategy when it was a dominant long distance provider facing growing competition from a growing number of competitors, and as prices for its product continually declined.

A similar strategy has been taken by incumbent telephone companies in the face of growing competition from VoIP providers. You might argue that telcos should have jumped into VoIP aggressively, matching competitor lower prices.

The suggestion is that sometimes a particular firm cannot compete in a particular line of business, on price. When that is the case, and when a contestant has very large market share, sometimes it will make better financial sense to harvest the business, and spend more organizational effort "finding something else to do."

It is a variation on the old theme that there always are some customers a particular contestant is better off not having. Incumbent mobile service providers frequently find themselves facing lower-cost competition, and it is not always possible to compete on that basis.

Dish Eyeing LightSquared Business Model?

2012-01-26T06:56:00.002-07:00

Dish Network recently stirred speculation about whether it now wants to expedite its construction of a national Long Term Evolution network, simply by indicating in a yet-private communication to the Federal Communications Commission that Dish wants to "revise" its plans. Revised plan?

Some have speculated that the request is to accelerate the proposed construction timetable, but that isn't clear. It might make sense, if Dish believes it now has a chance to supplant LightSquared as a major wholesale partner.

Dish Network needs an FCC waiver to use its satellite communications frequencies to support a terrestrial mobile network, as LightSquared also requires.

LightSquared has run into a wall because of interference with the Global Positioning System. Dish's proposal is seen as less problematic, as the frequencies it acquired last year from bankrupt satellite operators TerreStar and DBSD North America are further away from the spectrum used by GPS systems. Dish the successor to LightSquared?

Some now speculate that Dish might seen an opening, if, as some speculate, LightSquared fails to gain approval to use its spectrum to support a terrestrial Long Term Evolution network. Up to this point, Dish Network has suggested it would use its spectrum to build and operate a retail network.

There is no reason in principle why Dish could not operate both as a wholesale provider and a retailer, but there always is channel conflict when firms do so.

On the other hand, since LightSquared already has identified more than 30 wholesale customers, a Dish Network move to offer wholesale services would give Dish an immediate customer base and potential revenue, even if it decides there are retail branded operations it also wishes to support.

U.S. Mobile Advertising Grows Faster than Expected

2012-01-26T06:52:00.002-07:00

The U.S. mobile advertising market is growing far faster than expected, driven by the rapid ascension of Google’s mobile search advertising business, advertisers’ growing attraction to display inventory on tablet and smartphone devices, and the growing roster of mobile ad networks such as Google’s AdMob, Apple’s iAd, and Millennial Media, eMarketer says.

Mobile advertising spending in the US reached $1.45 billion in 2011, up 89 percent from $769.6 billion in 2010.

This year, US mobile ad spending will grow 80 percent to $2.61 billion.

The most significant adjustment in this forecast comes as a result of “Google’s exceptional mobile advertising performance,” which has propelled mobile search advertising far faster than previously expected, eMarketer says.

eMarketer estimates Google’s share of overall U.S. mobile ad revenues reached 51.7 percent, or about $750 million, in 2011. Mobile advertising grows faster than expected.

The firm previously forecast U.S. mobile ad spending would grow 47 percent to $1.8 billion in 2012, up from $1.2 billion last year.

Apple Sets Sales Records, Has $97 Billion in Cash

2012-01-24T18:00:00.000-07:00

Apple first quarter results show record quarterly revenue of $46.33 billion and record quarterly net profit of $13.06 billion.

The company sold 37.04 million iPhones in the quarter, 15.43 million iPads and 5.2 million Macs. Apple also has an astounding $97 billion in cash. Any "normal" company would face unbearable pressure to distribute that cash to shareholders. Apple Reports First Quarter Results

Revenue: $46.33 Billion versus $38.76 billion expected

EPS: $13.87 versus $10.07 expected

iPhone units: 37.04 million versus 30.2 million expected

iPad units: 15.4 million 13.2 million expected

Mac units: 5.2 million versus 5 million expected

iPod: 15.4 million versus 13.9 million expected, according to Bloomberg

Gross Margin: 44.7% versus 41.8% expected

March quarter revenue: $32.5 billion versus $31.9 billion expected

March quarter EPS: $8.50 versus $8.00 expected

Apple now has $97 billion in cash, short term, and long term securities

The iPhone's average selling price is up to $660

17% of Global Workers Telecommute

2012-01-24T17:36:00.000-07:00

About 17 percent of workers around the globe, particularly employees in the Middle East, Latin America and Asia, telecommute frequently, and nearly 10 percent work from home every day, according to a new Ipsos poll sponsored by Reuters. About one in five workers worldwide telecommute

Ipsos surveyed a total of 11,383 online connected employees from 24 countries.

Telecommuting is primarily taking place in emerging markets: those working in the Middle East and Africa (27 percent), Latin America (25 percent) and Asia-Pacific (24 percent) are considerably more likely than those in North America (nine percent) and Europe (nine percent) to telecommute ‘on a frequent basis.’

More specifically, employees in of India (56 percent), Indonesia (34 percent), Mexico (30 percent), Argentina (29 percent), South Africa (28 percent) and Turkey (27 percent) are most likely to be pursuing this form of employment.

On the other end, those in Hungary (three percent), Germany (five percent), Sweden (sixc percent), France (seven percent), Italy (seven percent) and Canada (eight percent) are least like to telecommute ‘on a frequent basis.’

Those with a high level of education are most likely to telecommute on a frequent basis (25 percent) followed by those under the age of 35 (20 percent) and those with a high household income (20 percent).

Are Android Users Subsidizing iPhone Users at Verizon Wireless?

2012-01-24T10:57:00.000-07:00

Subsidies Verizon Wireless is paying to entice consumers to buy Apple iPhones might also be penalizing Android devices, some now argue. Though top Android devices cost as much as Apple iPhones, high-end Android devices often sell for prices $100 to $200 higher than the iPhone.

In other words, Verizon is trying to recoup some of its cash flow and operating margin by making Android handset users pay more for their devices than Apple iPhone users.

Verizon is betting that buyers who want the high-end Android phones will pay, so they're marking those models up.

John Hodulik, an analyst at UBS AG has estimated that the iPhone subsidy could be as high as $400 per iPhone customer. If 13 million of the devices get sold in a year that implies a which $5.2 billion hit to earnings. Some argue that devices should not be subsidized, since doing so means consumers have to sign contracts. But iPhone subsidies are quite a big expense for firms such as Verizon Wireless.

From at least one perspective, contracts and subsidies offer value for consumers and service providers, with users getting devices they want at $400 lower prices, while service providers can smooth out recurring service revenues and reduce customer churn.

Apple has set a standard entry price of its newest smartphones at $199, with higher end models available with more storage. This year however, Verizon has set a new contract price for its high end Android phones at $299.

The implications are clear enough. If you like high-end Android devices, do not buy them from Verizon.

Both the Motorola Droid RAZR and the just released Google-branded Samsung Galaxy Nexus are $299 with a two year Verizon contract, and both are listed as costing $649 without a contract.

In contrast, Apple's 16GB iPhone 4S is offered for only $199, even though it costs the same $649 without a contact. Apple is getting a $450 subsidy, compared to just $350 for Android licensees Motorola and Samsung.

Verizon's $199 Android phones, including the Samsung Droid Charge, Motorola Droid 3 and Droid Bionic, cost $499, $459 and $589 respectively without a contract, making their subsidies worth just $300 to $390, or $150 to $60 lower than Apple's, one might note.

The closest Verizon's phones currently come to an iPhone subsidy appears to be the HTC Thunderbolt, which is being offered for $149, a $420 subsidy compared to its $569 full retail price. However, this involves a special promotional discount of $100, making the "sale" price of Android models still higher than regular price of any of Verizon's iPhones. Verizon Wireless can do what it wants, of course. But consumers should also do what they want.

75% of Enterprises Use Social Media for Customer Service

2012-01-24T06:05:00.001-07:00

Businesses use social media for a variety of reasons. Some 96 percent of respondents told Booz & Company that they are using social media for “advertising and promotions.”

Some 88 percent use social media for public relations. Some 75 percent use social media for customer service. Social value in business

Tablet, E-Reader Ownership Doubles in One Month: Unprecedented

2012-01-23T20:45:00.000-07:00

The share of adults in the United States who own a tablet of some sort nearly doubled from 10 percent to 19 percent between mid-December 2011 and early January 2012.

The ownership of e-readers also surged from 10 percent to 19 percent over the same time period. Tablet ownership doubled in two months

That is an unprecedented growth rate for any consumer electronics device. Tablet ownership also had been on a strong adoption path earlier in 2011 as well, but doubling in 30 days from a base of 10 percent seems never to have occurred before.

To be sure, 10 percent adoption historically has been an inflection point: it is the point in an adoption process that represents critical mass, after which adoption accelerates.

You'll have to click on this chart to view it in more detail, but it is one of the most useful bits of historical evidence you can use to estimate how long it might take an application, service or device to reach 10 percent penetration of U.S. households, for example.

There are some caveats. Not every innovation succeeds. This chart only shows you what happened with the most-popular consumer electronics services and products.

The reason for sharing the chart is that a panel I was recently on was asked how long it might take for near field communications technology to be adopted by a significant number of U.S. consumers.

My response, based on past work studying consumer electronics adoption rates, was that it can take quite a significant amount of time, between three and 10 years, to reach the crucial 10-percent-of-homes threshold, which seems to be the point at which any innovation really begins to accelerate, in terms of adoption. Consumer adoption patterns

Also, the more complicated the ecosystem, the longer it will take. Apple iPhones and iPads did not take long to reach the 10-percent penetration mark, because they operate in a fully-developed ecosystem where all that is required is purchase of a product, to obtain the value.

Telco Video Subscribers Approaching 100 Million

2012-01-23T20:09:00.001-07:00

Collectively, global telcos had a total of 94 million video entertainment subscribers at the end of the third quarter of 2011, giving them a 12 percent share of the video market. Given current growth rates the subscriber total will have passed 100 million at the end of 2011.

Of course, global statistics can obscure as much as they reveal. In the U.S. market, for example, neither AT&T nor Verizon competes on a national basis, and each is a relatively modest competitor.

Comcast alone has 22.4 million subs, while DirecTV has 19.8 million. Dish Network has 13.9 million subscribers and Time Warner Cable has 12 million.

AT&T has 3.6 million video subscribers, while Verizon Communications has about four million. Granted, Verizon ranks about seventh in size, while AT&T ranks eighth, but Comcast is about 5.5 times bigger than either AT&T or Verizon.

That is not to discount the importance of video services for telcos, either in terms of gross revenue or as a key component of the triple play that now is a service provider mainstay. But all fixed line services collectively are unable to drive overall growth at either AT&T or Verizon. That role exclusively is played by mobile services.

Telco Pay-TV Subscribers Approaching 100 Million

Rank	MSO	BasicVideoSubscribers
1	Comcast Corporation	22,360,000
2	DirecTV	19,760,000
3	Dish Network Corporation	13,945,000
4	Time Warner Cable, Inc.	12,109,000
5	Cox Communications, Inc.¹	4,789,000
6	Charter Communications, Inc.	4,371,000
7	Verizon Communications, Inc.	3,979,000
8	AT&T, Inc.	3,583,000
9	Cablevision Systems Corporation	3,264,000
10	Bright House Networks LLC¹	2,109,000
11	Suddenlink Communications¹	1,268,000
12	Mediacom Communications Corporation	1,100,000
13	Insight Communications Company, Inc.	670,000
14	CableOne, Inc.	628,000
15	WideOpenWest Networks, LLC¹	432,000
16	RCN Corp.¹	335,000
17	Atlantic Broadband Group, LLC	258,000
17	Knology Holdings	258,000
19	Armstrong Cable Services	242,000
20	Service Electric Cable TV Incorporated¹	217,000
21	Midcontinent Communications	204,000
22	MetroCast Cablevision	182,000
23	Blue Ridge Communications¹	171,000
24	General Communications	146,000
25	NewWave Communications	141,000

Earned Social Media Works, Study Finds

2012-01-23T19:49:00.000-07:00

What is the value of a "fan?" In other words, can we quantify the business value of social supporters of brands?

A study of Christmas and holiday promotions by Amazon, Best Buy, Target and Walmart suggests that social engagement can drive better results, at least as quantified by visits to retailer online sites.

The data suggets that earned social media impressions can stack up favorably against paid ads for brands that are effective with their social efforts, at least i terms of website visits.

Using an estimated value for earned impressions of $3.55 cost per thousand, Walmart earned $417,000 worth of impressions while Best Buy earned $86,000 in impressions.

When looking at the lift received from promotions that started in November 2011, all four brands received a lift of 2.2 times or higher. Target received the highest lift between October and the end of November at 3.5 times.

For most retailers, a significantly higher percentage of fans and friends of fans visited the retailer’s website, as compared to the rest of the Internet. About 64 percent of Amazon’s fans visited Amazon.com, compared to 27 percent of the total Internet.

For Best Buy, 18 percent of fans and 13 percent of friends of fans went to BestBuy.com, compared to eight percent of the total Internet. Earned social media:

Amazon Kindle Fire Content Sales Stronger than Expected?

2012-01-23T09:47:00.001-07:00

RBC Capital analyst Ross Sandler polled 216 Kindle Fire owners and concluded that Kindle Fire tablets are making Amazon more money than was originally expected. Sandler originally had estimated that each Kindle Fire unit would generate about $136 in content purchases over the useful life of the device. Content purchases on Kindle Fire

But Sandler’s most-recent survey of 216 Kindle Fire owners suggests content revenue might be higher than that.

The survey found that roughly 80 percent of users already have purchased ebooks, with 58 percent of respondents buying more than three e-books within the first two months of owning the tablet.

Averaged out, that’s five e-books per quarter, which nets Amazon $15 per Fire owner per quarter, assuming an average selling price of $10 for ebooks. That further implies revenue from e-books of about $60 a year.

About 41 percent of Fire owners also say they have bought at least three apps. This will put another $9 per Fire owner per quarter into Amazon’s coffers, or $36 a year of net revenue (after splitting gross revenue with content owners).

That implies possible gross sales of about $30 a quarter worth of apps, assuming Amazon’s share of revenue is 30 percent.

Those figures suggest annual Kindle Fire revenue of about $96 a year. Over three years, that suggests $288 of revenue for Amazon, even if users do not buy any video or audio products, which seems unlikely.