Each week the MEF team curates mobile stories from around the world. Essential news, the latest market insight & data nuggets, the Global News Round-up offers an instant international mobile content and commerce snapshot.
Global News Stories
Premium SMS flameout opens door to improved opt-in rates
Mobile Marketer
With AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon all dropping most premium SMS billing, this could open the door to higher opt-in rates for mobile programs and the loosening of regulation around these programs.
Last week’s announcement that the carriers would stop supporting premium SMS was not unexpected and points to how cramming – the practice of third parties adding a charge to a phone for a service the customer did not order – has become a major problem, adding up to an estimated $2 billion a year in fraudulent charges.
4G-LTE Networks Set To Double In Number By 2017 — When 1BN Of 8BN Total Mobile Connections Will Be 4G
Tech Crunch
The number of 4G-LTE networks in service globally is set to roughly double over the next four years, according to data by GSMA Intelligence, the research arm of the global mobile carrier association, the GSMA. Some 465 LTE networks are forecast to be in service across 128 countries by 2017, which it says is roughly double the number of live LTE networks today.
Mobile usage and apps in South Africa: the numbers you need to know
Memeburn
Sitting in your iOS 7 cocoon and assume everyone has an iPad? Or that SMS died out with the arrival of BBM? Perhaps you’re just under the impression that 99% of the population owns a Samsung Galaxy Something? Well, those assumptions are partially true — but if you’re looking at the mobile space in a country like South Africa, they’re not painting an accurate picture of which devices are being used, and how.
How Mobile Is Eating The World [SLIDE DECK]
Business Insider
Benedict Evans is an analyst at Enders Analysis and a freelance consultant. He’s well known for his quick bits of insight on Twitter and his ability to find deeper meaning within data and then clearly express it visually, as shown by the many posts on his blog (which brings in over 100,000 readers a month.) Last week he shared a new presentation that he’s been showing to clients that shows how mobile is taking over the digital landscape and looks at what that might mean for future tech businesses and companies like Apple, Google, and Facebook
Retailers will use mobile tech to get one over their online rivals
Mobile Entertainment
Mobile tracking technology will increase the level of consumer engagement and improve on customer experience. Online retailers are set to hit £10 billion in December takings for the first time ever according to IMRG and Capgemini. Last year, Black Friday online spend passed $1 billion for the first time – an increase of 26 per cent on 2011.
As mobile gadgets become bigger, some companies abandon Web sites altogether
Washington Post
The founders of online matchmaker Hinge were struggling to recruit potential daters when they decided in February to abandon their Web site to focus instead on mobile apps. The company’s core market of young singles is increasingly tethered to smartphones and other portable devices, the founders surmised, and use the gadgets for activities that can be done quickly while on the go. “More and more people are using mobile as opposed to desktop [computers] for things like dating,” chief executive Justin McLeod said. “That’s where the world’s going.”
$116 – the magic price for showrooming
Mobile Money Revolution
The study explored the mobile shopping habits of 5,926 consumers in the second quarter of 2013. The GE Capital Retail Bank study explored the mobile shopping habits of 5,926 consumers in the second quarter of 2013. It found that mobile shopping is pretty much standard among phone owners these days – with 61 per cent doing some form of it.
Global Mobile Android/iOS Messaging App Map Dominated By WhatsApp — But BBM Bags A Foothold
Tech Crunch
The mobile messaging app landscape continues to be highly geographically fragmented, with different messaging services doing well in different global regions. Despite ongoing localised variety, messaging veteran WhatsApp remains dominant in multiple global regions, even as relative newcomer – to Android and iOS – BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), gets a foothold on the social chit-chat map of these two platforms.
Shazam Partners with Mindshare to Launch Audio+
Mobile Marketing Magazine
Shazam is partnering with Mindshare to ensure all of the music assets of the brands it works with are optimised for second screeners. With Audio+, ad campaigns that stretch from TV to radio, online video and even OOH can now be tracked by the company. Shazam will audit each brand’s audio ROI and engagement metrics, while also working on a campaign strategy.
Global News Round-up – These articles are not written by MEF and do not represent any views of individuals, members or the organisation.
