Digital Lifescapes

This week, at Mobile World Congress 2013, we can expect numerous announcements that demonstrate the forward-looking trends in the global smartphone marketplace. Are you ready? Looking back, comScore has released data about the key trends in the U.S. smartphone industry during the three month average period ending December 2012. From web browsing and app usage to social networking, messaging and multimedia, your audience is going mobile. Your challenge is to translate mobile consumption and consumer behavior into your mobile business strategy. Apple ranked as the top smartphone manufacturer during the period with 36.3 percent share, while Google Android led as the number one smartphone platform with 53.4 percent share. 125.9 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones -- estimated at 54 percent mobile market penetration -- during the three months ending in December, up 5 percent since September. Apple ranked as the top OEM with 36.3 percent of U.S. smartphone subscribers -- t...

Ovum expects Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2013 to focus on solutions aimed at driving mobile network operator service revenues. Ovum says that they're looking for a sense of reality -- and the acknowledgment that mobile service providers are no longer the sole provider of communications services. I've selected the three most insightful anticipated revelations that Ovum analysts expect to see from the MWC13 event next week. The Mobile Ecosystem Prepares for the Internet of Things "Machine-to-machine communications (M2M) has been a theme of MWC for several years, with multiple showcases from vendors and operators. Increasingly, M2M is being repositioned as the Internet of Things (IoT) as the focus shifts to connecting smart objects to Internet applications," said Jeremy Green, Telco Strategy at Ovum. Whereas M2M emphasized the business-to-business opportunity, which was conceptualized as vertical silos and niche markets, the IoT suggests a much larger opportunit...