Netbooks and Mobile Computing in the China Market

Netbooks and Mobile Computing in the China Market.

Bruno Bensaid of Shanghaivest and founder of Mobile Monday Shanghai talks about the state of the Mobile Industry in China. What role may netbooks play with 3G being rolled out & how is the mobile internet being used in China?

Good Morning Vietnam

As I rolled out of the airport on my way to downtown Hanoi, the rice paddies and lush green vegetation were familiar images from the past. Vietnam is peaceful and thriving these days, but as you get closer to downtown Hanoi, it is clear there is a new war going on – and the weapon of choice is mobile phones. Vietnam has a population of nearly 90 million, and while 75% still live in rural areas, the country has more than 80 million mobile phone subscribers, with many people holding multiple numbers. Eight service providers are battling for the hearts and wallets of the people of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. The rural areas are largely untapped, which means that many city dwellers have multiple phones and subscriptions.

A throng of motorcycles and bicycles choke the bustling streets of Hanoi, and the drivers have one hand on the handlebar, and the other on a mobile phone pressed to their ears. While these drivers are making voice calls as they drive, Vietnam, like India and the Philippines is dominated by non- voice traffic, particularly SMS. This is why the next battleground in Vietnam revolves around the imminent launch of 3G Value Added Services, as it will be a natural for consumers to migrate from text to multimedia services.

Multimedia services such as live TV, portal access, video ringback tones, video blogging, and video surveillance will be rolled out over the next 6 months initially in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, and Da Nang, and then nationwide. Smartphone and netbook vendors as well as VAS providers are elbowing for position, as Vietnam is one of the top 15 most populous countries in the world. While inflation has recently become a problem and slowed the high growth rates of the last few years, the outlook remains strong and growth is still projected at 5%+ this year.

In Vietnam, the government controls the service providers and has granted four 3G licenses: Mobifone (mostly state owned by Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Corporation), Viettel (run by the military), Vinaphone (which will be the first to launch and is also state owned), and a joint venture between Hanoi Telecom and Electricity Vietnam Telecom. Expect fierce competition between these four operators as they compete to hold existing subscribers and capture new ones through the offering of a range of multimedia services at very competitive prices. Subscriber growth is booming, but ARPU continues to drop sharply. Vietnam is poised to become one of the largest mobile markets in Asia, as well as one of the most innovative.

China may well define new trends in 3G Video Services

China Telecom has launched 3G CDMA-2000 services in most cities, and China Unicom is soft-launching 3G WCDMA with multiple video oriented services. China Mobile is ramping up the launch of 3G TD-SCDMA, which is largely based on locally developed technologies.

One aspect that one could not ignore is the sheer scale of 3G activities, and what its global impact. The very large subscriber bases makes it difficult to extrapolate subscriber behavior in other countries to China. The recent experience of applications and services such as peer-to-peer streaming by Tencent, is I believe a convincing evidence that Chinese subscribers are far more video-aware than subscribers in other geographies.

It may well be that everybody will be surprised by the response of subscribers to various video applications, including video-calling, mobile video on demand, video ring back tones, and many new services that the highly creative Chinese software developers are likely to create, within the highly dynamic Chinese society. China may well define new trends in 3G video that other smaller countries did not dare to explore.

The Young and the Digital

The Young and the Digital

A short video about Craig Watkins’ upcoming book The Young and the Digital: What Migration to Social Network Sites, Games, Anytime, Anywhere Media Means for Our Future. For more information check out the website: http://www.theyoungandthedigital.com/.

3G.co.uk reports on 3G Mobile Broadband

Europe : Newly released 3G+ and Long Term Evolution (LTE) forecasts by technology and media specialist Coda Research Consultancy show that portable laptop and netbook users accessing the internet via mobile broadband will number 418m worldwide by 2017, will produce US$48bn in revenues, and will generate and consume an immense 1.8 exabytes of traffic per monh – a forty fold increase over 2009.

Coda Research’s report into mobile broadband via netbooks and laptops shows that the most significant growth will occur in the Asia-Pacific region, where users will amount to 162m by 2017. Europe will account for 94m users, and together, Asia Pacific and Europe will account for 61% of all users. The picture for LTE is even more dramatic, with nearly three quarters of worldwide LTE users coming from these two regions by 2017.

For the full story got to http://www.3g.co.uk/PR/July2009/3G-Mobile-Broadband-Via-Laptop-Users-to-Reach-418m-Worldwide-3G.html

Middle East telcos look to service innovation for revenue growth

Telco CEOs looked at future growth during Middle East Communications event Mecom 2009 in Abu Dhabi. As mobile penetration in the region continues to boom, leaders discussed how to engage with customers and make money through offering innovative services. Rob Jones was there, speaking to various company heads, including Khalid Al-Kaf, CEO of Saudi Arabia’s Mobily.

Vietnam ramps up to 3G launch

I was in Vietnam in the middle of May, and it was my first visit. I was really overwhelmed by the extent of modernization that is taking place there. Several mobile operators are preparing to launch 3G in late 2009 (desirably before the Tết festivities). 3G Video value added services are attracting strong interest, whether live TV, Video on Demand, Video-calling based services such as video surveillance and video portals. 3G may be an additional strong motor for local communication industry development and growth, in particular for the local system integrators and Application Service Providers.

Make Tea with your Mobile?

Kenya Citizen TV

The mobile revolution has certainly made our lives much easier from simple communication to complex banking transactions. But there is one Kenyan innovator who is seeking to stretch this mobile revolution even further. How about using your phone to make tea from the comfort of your couch? One Simeon Mwaura thinks it is not only possible, but practical.

Mobile Advertising – what’s holding it back?

Big Brands Lag on Mobile Ad Infrastructure

AdAge — The Interactive Advertising Bureau Marketplace conference on mobile advertising is designed as a pep rally of sorts. But no matter how positively its nuts-and-bolts panels start, their discussions inevitably drift toward that which still holds mobile back. In this video from this month’s session, Michael Collins, CEO of GroupM network’s mobile marketing agency Joule, ticks off a series of maddening problems that hamper the growth of the nascent industry.