September 23, 2003
European mobile phone market struggles
European mobile phone market struggles
A slow quarter for renewals and new subscribers hampered the Western European mobile phone market, which declined by 2.4% year-on-year in the second quarter of 2003, according to IDC. Despite vendors offering increasingly diverse product portfolios, the mobile industry is facing the reality that a market driven by mobile phone replacements is tougher than one driven by new subscribers.
"Although leading vendors have become increasingly adept at lowering their cost base and targeting end-users, increasing saturation means that new technologies are failing to stimulate greater demand among new subscribers for mobile phones in Europe, in what has essentially become a highly competitive renewal market" commented Andrew Brown, program manager for European Mobile Devices at IDC.
Posted by at 02:04 PM | Comments (1)
Viewpoint: The View from Japan -- Is Europe’s Mobile Market Catching Up?
The past two weeks we have been traveling through Europe looking at the progress of the mobile Internet in the "Old World." As many of our readers are based in Europe and the US, we would like to share some of our observations and make some stark comparisons with the Japanese market.
Color handset penetration in Europe is at almost 5 percent. As in Asia, the most popular services are chat, e-mail, downloads of ringtones, wallpapers and games. This proves once again that Japanese and Koreans are not as different from Western people as some marketers seem to believe.
MMS uptake is disappointing so far. Only a small fraction of those with an MMS handset send multimedia messages. Reasons for this include high prices for MMS, the lack of a critical mass of devices for peer-to-peer messaging, and limited interoperability between carriers. Once penetration rates surpass 15 percent, we expect MMS usage to start growing, just as it has in Japan with J-Phone%u2019s sha-mail and DoCoMo%u2019s i-shot services.
European business models for carrier-operated portals are less favorable for content providers than they are in Japan. Revenue share agreements of 50-50 percent are not uncommon in the market.
Big carrier groups like Vodafone and T-Mobile host a lot of content from their own platforms and are directly competing with the providers of ringtones and games that cannot have their content linked into the
portals.
Though the quality of GPRS browser phones is improving, we found
quite a number of software glitches that would have lead to an
immediate recall of all phones in Japan. A Vodafone live! Panasonic phone
crashed in our hands at regular intervals. Fortunately, the customer
service desk was willing to replace the phone.
We were impressed by the latest Alcatel and Sagem phones with Openwave
browsers. These low-priced phones have good color screens and are
equipped with a camera. While a year ago, one had to navigate through
a complicated menu structure to open a WAP/GPRS session, nowadays
more phones give WAP access through a single press of a button. GPRS
roaming worked remarkably well. Without missing a beat, we were able to
connect from the UK to the OrangeWorld portal in the Netherlands and
access all services.
Nokia has too strong a position in the European market. They cover
the whole value chain of the mobile industry. In addition to their
almost 40 percent handset market share in Europe, they also have
a solid presence with network infrastructure and content through
Club Nokia. This dominant position is hampering innovation in the
market.
Our overall impression is that the mobile Internet is finally taking
off in Europe -- but at a slower pace than everybody expected a year
ago.
-- Arjen van Blokland
Posted by at 01:53 PM | Comments (1)
September 22, 2003
Area Mobile - Germany
Posted by at 12:20 PM | Comments (1)
Mobile Java Games in Japan
Selection of games available for Vodaphone/J-Phone Java-enabled cellular phones in Japan. Available for Y100-Y300 with (usually) unlimited plays, there's no shortage of variety. Some are great, many suck, and a few are surprisingly well-translated to a tiny screen with a horrible controller.
http://nfg.2y.net/games/jphonegames/
Posted by at 12:29 AM | Comments (1)
September 21, 2003
Contextualizing the Mobile Internet (PDF)
Richard Tee recently finished his M.A. degree at the University of Amsterdam, majoring in Information Science. Exchange programs at the University of Helsinki and Melbourne University instigated his interest in the area of mobile telephony and mobile internet services.
Research trips to Japan have resulted in an article published in a journal for IT professionals, as well as his final thesis entitled Contextualizing the mobile internet. A scholarship has enabled him to currently take part in a second M.A. programme that deals with the development of technological innovations in a European context.
For ECDC Richard is involved with cross-disciplinary research sponsored by the European Commission's IST programme, where he is focusing on mobile content and usage issues. He presently builds a nowledge base about this pressing issue. more
Posted by at 11:48 PM | Comments (1)
September 13, 2003
WifiSense
WiFisense scans for the presence of WiFi (802.11) networks wherever you go. It detects the networks' signal strength, and whether they are password protected (WEP-enabled) or not.
When WiFisense finds a network, it uses patterns of light and sound to announce its availability, quality and accessibility.
For more information
For more information 2
Posted by at 09:25 AM | Comments (1)
Interactive Road - Sweden
At the Mobility studio at Sweden's Interactive Institute, they've done a whole series of projects on "The Interactive Road," where they've networked cars and motorcycles, and developed games for kids in the back seat.
Posted by at 09:15 AM | Comments (1)
EVill.net
EVill Net, the free wireless network in the heart the East Village.
Posted by at 09:00 AM | Comments (1)
RFID to replace UPD Bar Codes
BOSTON - A consortium developing radio-tagged chips to replace bar codes in stores posted documents labeled confidential on its Web site that detail strategies to counter complaints the technology will be misused by retailers, the government or criminals to snoop on consumers.
The documents from the Auto-ID Center, a research group affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, contain advice from center officials and a public relations firm Fleishman-Hillard on how to "neutralize opposition" and respond to potential privacy concerns from the public and media.
Among their suggestions: retailers should refer to the technology as"improved barcodes."
The radio tag being developed by Auto-ID can help companies track their products through the supply chain so that, for instance, they know exactly when a batch has moved from the factory floor to a distributor, or when a particular store is running low.
Posted by at 08:55 AM | Comments (1)
September 12, 2003
Mobile Parking in Austria
Willkommen bei Mobile Parking !
(10/10/2003, BWCS Staff) Just one week after its introduction in Vienna on 1 October, m-parking has become the most popular m-commerce project in Austria. By Day 7, a total of 20,604 m-parking applications had been received, a milestone which had not been expected to be reached until April 2004.
The m-parking system, which is being financed by the City of Vienna and provided by equipment vendor Siemens and wireless operator Mobilkom Austria, allows users to pay for parking via their mobile handsets. Similar teleparking schemes have been successfully trialled in Singapore and Australia.
While users are reluctant to bump up their mobile phone bills with higher priced goods and services typically paid for by credit card, an Australian survey carried out in late 2002 found that 83% of mobile users would be willing to use their mobile phone for small payments such as for parking and vending machines.
Posted by at 11:47 AM | Comments (1)
September 10, 2003
World's Smallest Film Festival
World's Smallest Film Festival
The World's Smallest Film Festival, produced by BigDigit, Inc., is the first competitive showcase of digital video and vector graphic content for the new generation of mobile phones, PDAs, and other mobile devices. We bring together top content innovators with leaders in wireless, mobile technology, multimedia software developers to showcase and encourage the full potential of creative multimedia content for the mobile world.
Posted by at 11:01 PM | Comments (1)
September 09, 2003
Microsoft, Motorola working on mobile software
Microsoft, Motorola working on mobile software Orange, France Telecom's wireless subsidiary, says Microsoft is working toward a deal to provide software for Motorola's cell phones for sale to Orange's customers.
Posted by at 10:21 AM | Comments (1)
Sony Ericsson sets 3G phone launch
Sony Ericsson plans a January launch for its first mobile phone that will run on third-generation networks and can be used for video conferences.
Posted by at 10:20 AM | Comments (1)
KDDI -- Japan's Front-runner with 3G and a Host of New Services
Our recent newsletters focused on the advances of DoCoMo and Vodafone/ J-Phone, so this week we take a closer look at KDDI -- Japan's second largest carrier, with the fastest growing user base nationwide. While Vodafone is DoCoMo i-mode's big competitor abroad, KDDI is seriously challenging DoCoMo's business on the homefront.
Over the past two years, KDDI has transformed itself from a primarily tech-driven company into a powerful consumer marketing machine. It stopped its PDC (2G) network service this March to focus exclusively
on the development of its CDMA-services. The use of Qualcomm's CDMA technology has proven to be a smart move so far. All 3G (CDMA1X) handsets are backwards compatible with the 2G cdma2000 network, resulting in solid country-wide coverage. Thus far, results have been most impressive.
KDDI's subsribers growth topped that of DoCoMo in August. KDDI's market share of 3G handsets in Japan is 92.7 percent, and the company boasts an impressive subscriber base of 9.2 million. Because it operates only a single network, KDDI can keep costs lower than DoCoMo and J-Phone, both of whom have to maintain their PDC and W-CDMA networks. KDDI
passes on some of its cost reduction to customers by giving discounts and subsidies on handsets to attract new users.
After the start of its CDMA1X service, data ARPU was priced at 3,470 yen. More recently, this number has fallen to 2,290 yen, which is quite reasonable. Reduction of KDDI’s packet fees led to an increase in
traffic by a factor of three.
KDDI’s content providers may also benefit from the growing traffic. Total sales of KDDI’s official content partners grew by 9 percent to 437 million yen in three months to June. With these numbers, KDDI shows a slightly better performance than DoCoMo.
The most interesting service introduced by KDDI is "chaku-uta." Users can download high-quality real music files of 100kB and set the 20-second songs as "alarm bell" or "phone ringer." The higher bandwidth available for the CDMA1X phones enables this service by using the EZmovie format, KDDI’s video format.
At Mobidec2003 late last month, KDDI's content manager Makoto Takahashi showed off the success of the chaku-uta service. "There are about 5 million downloads per month," he proudly announced, "and in mid-August
we reached the 20 million download mark."
Suprisingly, KDDI’s statistics do not show any cannibalizing effect of "chaku-uta" on "chaku-mero" (the ring tones service). By the end of the year, Takahashi is planning to introduce some chaku-movies that will
make full use of the high bandwidth. Before Christmas, the Sannaklaus songs and video-clips will be playing away merrily on the phones of KDDI customers each time friends or family give them a call.
-- Arjen van Blokland
Posted by at 09:59 AM | Comments (1)
September 08, 2003
3G Motorola A920 Lock Down
Europe via ComputerWire : Hutchison 3G UK Holdings Ltd has locked down the new Motorola-built smart phone for its "3" service, seemingly in an effort to stop the device being used for nefarious purposes. However, the plan denies users of the device access to applications written for the similar Symbian-based handset from Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB.
Symbian Ltd confirmed to last week that the A920 featured a "closed" version of its operating system, but 3 has only just confirmed what this means in practice. A spokesperson for the operator told ComputerWire that the device was being treated as a "walled garden" with users only able to install 3-approved applications on the device.
Posted by at 10:33 AM | Comments (1)
September 03, 2003
Photographs with GPS information
the ability to brand photographs with GPS information which could spawn a killer app real soon now...
http://www.photokyo.com/keitai-show.asp?uid=1&entry=563
Posted by at 10:50 AM | Comments (1)
Motorola A835
Expected Availability - Second Half 2003
Powered with 3G technology, sleek looks and enough features to make anyone drool, the Motorola A835 is here to take you to the next dimension of personal communication and mobile fun. Offering the latest in multi-media entertainment, with advanced messaging, video phone, Bluetooth wireless technology, full browsing and a large display capable of supporting up to 64,000 colors, the Motorola A835 is small enough to fit in your palm but cool enough to make you the envy of everyone. Quit juggling all of your gadgets. The model A835 combines a phone, PC, still and video cameras, arcade, music and PDA capabilities in one device. Step into the future and experience the ultimate mobile lifestyle with the Motorola A835.
Posted by at 10:34 AM | Comments (1)
LBS- cell size issues
cell size is an issue, especially in suburbs where there are less signs/directions to locate yourself as in the town.
you connect to the antenna of the strongest signal which is not necessarily the nearest one. in downtown areas where cell sizes are smaller the radio environment is very complex and the networks are
busy especially around train stations. these increases the chances you get connected to a distant cell.
if we can expect accuracy of one kilometer, then it's really good enough for J-Phone's local weather information service.
regardless of the talks we had already, why DoCoMo need PHS and GPS to make DLP usable? and still fails to convince the customers? fairly speaking, au/KDDI's LBS is also below expectations. it's not easy to develop the LBS market in Japan, even you have GPS.
Posted by at 10:29 AM | Comments (1)
