Mobile Point View by Paul Ruppert

Monetizing Never Ending Friending: Hook Mobile

CTIA Innovation Sighting: Hook Mobile

At CTIA I've been examining the Social Networking Services space, sometimes referred to as Social Network media, and came across Hook Mobile, and their CEO Terry Hsiao.

Hook generates additional revenues for social networks and their application developers by offering an open API that delivers a "low calorie" multimedia experience using MMS. They essentially serve as an enabler by sitting at the center of a pyramid formed by the SNS providers such as Facebook and MySpace, operators such as ATT or Vodafone, the application providers that are riding on the open APIs fostered by the SNS portals and the subscribers.

Hook provides an innovative technical solution heightening "interoperability" between SNS and mobile operators.  Technically they simplify the delivery process of mobile multimedia by universally rendering to the handset, providing the back end billing solution, all enabling the capture of incremental revenue opportunities of the volume of rich media user generated content. The expectation is that much of the content consumption will from big branded content to the application level, or UG (user generated) content. So Hook will be well positioned and prepared for that shift. It already has gotten significant industry attention including being selected by IDC as a Top 10 Mobile Company to Watch in 2008.

Listen to my interview with Hook Mobile CEO Terry Hsiao (13 mins)

The company is founded by veteran entrepreneur Terry Hsiao, who co-founded the immensely successful Inphomatch--which grew to Mobile 365--providing SMS messaging interoperability thus feeding the explosion of text messaging, especially in the US. Mobile 365 was sold for $417 million in September 2006, so Terry is a well tested entrepreneur. He's secured funding for the company through Accel Partners and IDG Ventures, both which closely invest in mobile.

Besides the technical solution provided, unlike many Web 2.0 companies Hook pursues as strategy close to the carriers, so they are well positioned with the American operators, as well as in close trials with Facebook, MySpace and others. It is critical to note that Accel also was early (pre-Microsoft) investor in Facebook. So don't be surprised if Hook is soon to be a solution on Facebook.

Looking Out at CTIA 2008

March 31st through April 3rd, I'm going to be at CTIA in Las Vegas, with 50,000 other mobilistas of the wireless ecosystem.

To streamline my efforts I'm going to be on the look out for the usual innovations and interesting announcements at the event. But instead of randomly waiting to see what comes down the pike--or through the email box--I'm focusing my attention to three areas of strong interest to me right now: Mobile Advertising, extending Social Networking Services (SNS) and social media to the mobile, and mobile payments.

Some might wonder if there's any connection to the three. There is in my mind, but it isn't clearly linear. Mobile advertising is viewed as the revenue bridesmaid. Lots of hype but not much traction yet. All true. SNS is the biggest growing phenomenon of Web 2.0, and whenever you go mobile that just improves things on a global scale. Mobile payments, since payments are inevitable.  Burrowing deeper, advertising is already a major aspect of the SNS phenomenon, trying mobile advertising or even purchasing digital goods via your mobile from an SNS portal will someday be a big thing. Of course such a dynamic requires a payments mechanism. Hence the logic.

Please stay tuned, and if there's any thing you think I should cover,you're reporter on order is available. Just drop me a note and I'll try to follow up on it.

Cheers, Paul

SMS Globalization and Growth: Interview with Sybase365 CEO, Marty Beard

10 billion SMS a month and growing

Ever hear of Sybase 365?              

If not, it plays a major role in the mobile messaging value chain for the globe's wireless operators as well as premium messaging providers supporting ring tones, mobile commerce and advertising. It is one of the largest mobile messaging aggregators and interoperability provider whose core value proposition is managing the ever growing complexity of passing SMS and MMS messages around the globe. Sybase purchased Mobile 365 in September of 2006, thus combining the worlds largest messaging enabler (2006 revenues of $110 million) with one of the leading enterprise software providers, Sybase, to create Sybase 365.

Listen to my interview with Sybase 365 CEO Marty Beard (16 mins)

In my interview we cover a wide range of topics including:

• 10 billion SMS per month for operators through the Sybase365 network
• Managing the world of difference between flat ARPUs in developed markets, versus low ARPUs in emerging markets
• Sybase365's foray into mobile banking from their banking software experience
• Balancing the larger international revenues against US domestic text revenues especially with strong growth driven by the Middle East, Africa and Asia
• Sybase 365's efforts to innovate the traditional SMS through the development of more secure SMS, natural language interfaces for messaging as well as user generated content within the realm of text messaging

Mobile-palooza: CTIA Action

Heading to CTIA '08 in Las Vegas next week?

I'm going to be participating in a Round table Media event sponsored by Airwide solutions at CTIA 08.

From 2 pm to 4 pm, April 1st, at the Renaissance Hotel in Las Vegas, Steve Bratt, CEO of W3C will be opening up the discourse.   

The topic: "Web 2.0 comes to Handsets — New Issues and Upside for Monetizing the Mobile Web” 

It is going to be an rollicking event with 30, yes 30, members of the mobile ecosystem drawn from technologist, content providers, media, and analysts coming together to generate ideas. Then a Party! (see below). Participants include:

• Roger Cheng, Dow Jones Reporter
  Mickey Alum Khan, Mobile Marketing Magazine
  John Styers, CEO of Mobilco, former MD for Sprint Media
  Kaj Hagros, VP of Market Development, Airwide Solutions
  John Puterbaugh, Nellymoser
  Andy Miller, CEO, Quattro Wireless
  DeWayne A. Nelon, CEO, Avot Media
  Rob Adler, CEO, Go2Media
  Pared Reitzen, CEO Mobile Storm
  Ameen Ahmad, VP, SnapTell
  Colin Gibbs, RCR Wireless
  Linda Barrabee, Yankee Group
  Jack Philbin, Vibes Media President and Co-founder
  Jonathan Steuer, VP & GM of Media/Entertainment and Technology of Inococulture
  Alice Cuneo, Ad Age
  Debi Jones, MobileJones
  Darla Mack, Nokia S60 News
  Oliver Starr, StarrTrek
• Paul Ruppert, Mobile Point View, CEO Global Point View Ltd.

Following the round table will be a "Blogger Hot Seat" which will be the bloggers in the room getting to grill the participants. Party from 4:30 to 7PM at the -- Envy lounge inside the Renaissance Hotel--Aboslute Gibson, Up, please.

The only qualification for entry to the cocktail reception is that you are a blogger. So if you would like to attend email debi AT corante dot_com to RSVP. Come on by, meet some industry thought leaders. OPEN BAR !!

Otherwise if you're just attending CTIA and interested in meeting me, drop me a note. It's always good to meet my readers, who are, of course, nothing if not people doing interesting things.

Seeking Mobile Zen

I opened my post titled 'Mobile Zen' with: "Zen means waking up to the present moment. That is, perceiving a mobile moment exactly as it is, rather than through the filter of our ideas and opinions of being free from our fixed  past. When you're talking, just talk; when you're texting just text, when you're mobile searching, just find; and so on." over at Mobile Messaging 2.0 for this week. The focus has been "What isn't mobile" and after writing it I thought Mobile Point View readers would enjoy it as well. You can read it there, or the rest here....

What then is Mobile Zen? Consider

"Mobile Zen is the instantaneous experience of catching a radio link, untethered. Since the experience of mobile communication is one of being free from physical links, our bonds and exchanges of communicating are constantly in flux, with what we really are only defined by the experience of the moment, the act of coupling. Ask the big question "What is (or is  not) mobile?" then one must answer sincerely and honestly "Don't know" since the experience is constantly changing.

Mobile Zen is something that is only happening spontaneously while you are doing it. All of life within the mobile context then is constantly in a state of change. Every airborne bit or byte in the universe is somewhere different every millionth of a second.

In fact, anything that we can explain within Mobile Zen must be past-tense. What was then is past, what is now is present, and different. Even if its about communicating our most immediate feelings, thoughts or photos, it is not the same experience the second after it passes through our minds, across our lips or through our finger tips.

Mobile Zen is Constantly Changing

Think of your view of "what is mobile?" Is it what it was a second ago, or a year ago, or what it is now? And what will it be tomorrow? Different than now, very different than yesterday. In fact the moment we say the word “mobile" and "view",  the view has already changed into something new. Human neural structure enables over 12,000 impressions per second spread across our physical senses and coordinated by abstract intellect. So, what is the 'Mobile Reality then?

Isn’t it always a very limited view of being connected only through some, any--all, mobile communications which frames our experience at any given moment? And that which we are aware of, becomes our own narrow impression of the world itself. As we have defined mobile in the past will it necessarily change in the future? After all, ultimate untethered mobile may be found in the future through "inside out" networks. Networks where the node may be connected to a fiber network, but the architecture sits in your home, not within a geographic cell of a "macro-network" of base stations and towers.  Such will be the way of femto cells. Are any of our views of Mobile then actually true in the absolute sense of the word, or are they all just our subjective impressions, based on an individual experience of what we are perceiving in an untethered moment?

Obviously, with this in mind, there are a wide array of free from physical links possible at each moment, through a broadening number of nodes; therefore there is no limitation on the number of mobile "existences", and in any absolute sense, existence itself is defined only as being untethered, unlinked, free from concrete connections, yet still coupled in the intercourse of communication.

Discard Past Orthodoxies

How then can we experience the mobile existence? The mobile experience simply IS. The problem is that we are usually trying to create our own model of the world based on where we sit. the descriptor of being "unconnected."  In the US, the word is "cellular" focusing on the technical infrastructure of being without a physical link. In Europe, the term is "mobile" conveying being out and about, untethered and unfettered in how you communicate (my preference). In Japan, the term is "Keitai" literally meaning "snug" conveying intimate fit and communications portability.

Then as a student of Mobile Zen, the epiphany is acceptance that when it comes to mobile, "All is one, and one is all”. And simply mobile is mobile when it isn't tethered, any node sitting in your hand from phone to Palm-top. The Mobile Zen reflects a simplicity that draws our attention to that which is essential, stripping away the extra. All things connected are not mobile. You have now reached the experience of Mobile Enlightenment and Mobile Nirvana.

Yet, lest not forget the teachings of Lao Tzu, "they who tell do not know; they who know do not tell."

So, did I capture the Zen of Mobile? What do you think?

Chinese Wife Sends Message after being Dropped

Mobile Matrimonial Wars continue

According to Chinese news service Xinhua, a Chinese woman in Weifang city in the eastern province of Shandong, set fire to 400 spanking new mobile phones in response to her husband leaving her.

37 year old "Mrs. Wang" seemed inclined to send a message to her hubby over the lack of bliss in their marriage. The Wang couple ran a successful phone retail business in Weifang. Weifang known as the Kite Capital of the World," is "flying high" due to its growth.

The surge in the Wang phone business  had put the marriage on the rocks, and the couple frequently fought according to the Qilu Evening News.  On March 3rd, after a "bitter row", the husband "slammed the door and left their home."

Wrought with despair, and crazed--or focused--with anger Mrs. Wang collected their entire stock of mobile phones, tossed them on the bed, set them afire and left. Acrid black smoke brought the fire brigade who quickly subdued the flames, but not before the handsets, valued at 300,000 Yuan (US$ 42,100) were consumed. 

Mrs. Wang has been apprehended and charged with arson.

SMS Dangers: Send, Bump, Bruise

Walk & Text Wounds may be the next front in the attack on texting by the powers that be within the Nanny state? Just wait until state legislators get wind of an investigation by the Star Newspaper, one of those cheeky London Fleet Street papers known for their bodacious page 3 girls, that's the front page on the right>>>>>>>>>oh, you already noticed?

According to the Star's crack investigative efforts, over 6 million Brits were injured in some way because they were so immersed in the experience of sending an SMS text message they failed to look up! Most seemed to be situationally unaware of such things as lamp posts and other immovable objects including garbage cans (trash bins in Brit speak), car barriers (bollards), or stepping off the curb (pavement).

Broken Bones & Fractured Skulls, oh my!

These were not simple "slip and falls" or Text Messenger's Thumb which I've written about before, but ranged from broken noses to fractured skulls. The survey was sponsored by the British information (directory) service provider 118118, which is quite adept at driving awareness with their off beat marketing. BONG!

According to the Daily Star, there are now plans to set up "mobile lanes" akin to bicycle lanes for text addicts to skirt around dangerous spots.' Now that's a good mix, speeding bikes and wandering pedestrians looking down at their iPhone. Layer in all those who are  listening to their "life soundtrack" with iPod ear buds, and CRASH!

According to an interviewed activist from a group called Living Streets, who warned: “Our pavements are increasingly becoming obstacle courses.” Huh, what's changed here in regards to sidewalk topography?

Aha, here's the culprit--commerce. To protect and serve the texting public 118118 has launched a pilot project protecting such lame texters by installing texting bumper guards on offending lamp posts and other obstacles in London's Brick Lane starting yesterday. 118118 spokesman William Ostrom said: “Hopefully this scheme will reduce the risk of embarrassing injury.” Scheme indeed.

Very clever way for 118118 to get their brand "close" to their consuming public and very consistent with their intruiging brand positioning!

So what do you think of 118118's innovative way to bring attention to their brand, slick advertising or sorry excuse?

MWC Podcast: Mobile Transactions & Bharti Telesoft

Mobile Payments, Mobile Transactions, mCommerce, Pay by Mobile, Mobile Money Transfer, mMoney, however you call it is becoming a very crowded space  and it all comes down to the Mobile Financial Services Market .

I've written about  it in the past in "Mobile Payments: Top 10 Issues between Banks & Operators" and "Mobile Payments Tipping Point" and "Text M for Money" and "$1.1 Billion passed in Chinese Mobile Payments" and "Hawala Money"...well you get the picture, this is a space I'm sharpening my perspectives on.

Clash of the Titans--and the under-card-- Rumble of the Developed & Emerging Economies

At the Mobile World Congress there was huge attention to the Mobile Payments market. The GSMA's Pay by Mobile and Mobile Money Transfer briefings were oversubscribed by 5x !  Beyond the obvious titantic clash between MNOs vs. FIs, there is the conflict between technologies such as simple SMS vs. other bearer access points such as USSD, GPRS or even IVR in the mobile transactions space. Of course the really big conflict is going to be services already becoming available in emerging markets affecting the development of mobile transactions in developed markets. Who will lead and shape this space, the unbanked or the overly banked?

Some quick data points picked up in Barcelona:

• Mobile payment usage via a mobile enabled payment mechanism is expected to be used by 1.4 billion people by 2015, or 26% of the user base
• In a survey by EDC, mobile money transfers is considered to be the most strategically important mobile financial service in the future
• By 2012 it is estimated that 12% of subs in developed markets and 9% in developing markets will  use domestic money transfers, which translates into 504 million users globally.
• SMS is viewed as the preferred channel for mobile money exchanges                                                                                                                               My friend, and emerging markets mobile payments specialist, Michele Scanlon suggested I take a look at Bharti Telesoft, so I cornered a conversation with Kresh Goomany, Vice President of Bharti Telesoft's Africa Region.

Bharti Telesoft's Mobiquity platform embraces the mobile phone as a convenient payment  and transaction medium. They have open APIs to both banking and credit card gateways enabling operator services providing a high level of security, making it highly a flexible service delivery platform utilizing a multi-bearer access utilizing SMS, USSD, GPRS or IRV platforms. The Mobiquity platform is a swiss army knife of mobile banking initiatives covering mobile banking, ticketing, money transfer, bill payments, pre-paid airtime top-up, micro-credit transactions, credit card interfaces. Seems to do it all...although from a US centric perspective, I've yet to see any of these presentations which cover the mobile as a "gift cards" mechanism.

Listen to my podcast with Bharti Telesoft's Kresh Goomany (9 mins)

The value proposition of Bharti Telesoft is their genetics and the geography they're focusing on. Bharti Telesoft is a spin off of Airtel with roughly 40 million subscribers in India, providing value added services for the Indian market for some years. Now they are moving into the high growth, low ARPU, unbanked markets in middle Asia and Africa for the mobile transactions business. They open with their "Pre Top" (pre-paid top off) services for operators, and then move up the value chain to FIs or operators offering Roaming Re-charges, Mobile Banking such as balance queries and alerts, money transfers such as domestic or international remittances as well as mobile payments covering utility bills. Clearly they have the right strategy in entering the emerging markets, especially Africa which Kresh covers their market strategy in depth in the podcast. If Bharti Telesoft is defining the development of the mobile financial services markets in developing economies, what's next?

Bharti Telesoft: Big player to follow in the Mobile Payments / Mobile Transactions space.

What do you think of Bharti Telesoft's prospects? Why aren't any western vendors of this size so well positioned as Bharti Telesoft? Will they eventually control the mobile payments play globally or is this likely to be a market structured along regional differences? Tell me what you think.

 

MWC Slick Sightings Trifecta: 3 Winners--Inside, GestureTek and Tagattitude

I've been writing in earlier posts about some slick innovation sightings in the mobile industry which I saw at the Mobile World Congress --Inside, GestureTek, and Tagattitude.

Seems my views were shared by the powers that be, namely the GSMA Innovation Awards.  Congratulations to GestureTek (motion detection for a mobile using the on-board camera) which was the Overall winner, Inside (contactless payments chips and software) took away the  Award for Most Innovative Device Centric Technology, and Tagattitude (use of the voice channel for secure NFC transactions) won the award for Most Innovative Consumer Application.

Congratulations to all the winners.  Guess I should have stopped at Ladbrooks to place some bets before hand.

Predictive Text Commission

Saturday mornings are usually when I'm trying to bang out my weekly post while my 11 year old fumbles around making himself a breakfast of Chips Ahoy, Oreos or some such sweet-stuff until his prison warden Pop shows up. 

Today's tasks included adding John Puterbaugh's blog Mobile 2.0 and Emerging Mobile Media Services to my blog roll. John, the Chief Strategist at Nellymoser, and I met at an InMobile event at the Mobile World Congress two short weeks ago. (John's on the left)We had an engaging conversation and he'll be a pod cast guest here in the near future. Since I was adding  Mobile 2.0 to the log rolling blog roll, I figured I should edit the list, and started to read through other blogs I had paid neglectful attention to. Mobhappy made me happy.

Words we should use vs. Words we do use

Russell Buckley and Carlo Longino's Mobhappy post"Where do the T9 people get their words?" was very insightful and included this dry British take off of two Oxford-like dons on the demands and dilemmas of predictive text functionaly. I wonder what the Chinese Pinyan equivalent might be like with Zi? Check this out from YouTube.