The year of the smartphone is here. Which company will be #1, #2 and #3 by year end 2012? Apple, Googorola, Micronokia? Or more realistic Samsung or maybe Huawei? With 4G/LTE roll-out the whole story becomes even more interesting. Will RIM/Blackberry survive? Can Sony make the turnaround? Which role can HTC play after a bad Q4/2011 and a significant revenue drop announced for Q1/2012 of 36 percent in yesterdays Investor Relations Conference? What about LG? It is a long run – a marathon. Let´s watch out!
Category Archives: Products & Innovation
Where to smartphone manufacturer?
At the moment the battle is mainly driven by Apple and Samsung. Just watch this new TVC from Samsung USA. It seems to be that the top five are just observing each other and nobody of them wants to make the “first move” before Apple has released the new iPhone 5. I believe this “strategy” is quite dangerous as Cupertino has no hurry, as last weeks New York City “Educational Event” has shown that they have enough trending topics to keep their pacemaker status. Let´s watch out!
(c) Samsung Mobile USA
Google: “Search, plus your world!”
Google, Bing & Co. – the next level of search is coming in 2012.
(c) Google
Facebook Timeline – another perspective!
First of all: Facebook Timeline is a great new functionality which I didn´t expected it to be. Thank you, Mark Zuckerberg! When it was announced a few weeks ago I first thought it is just about to show my whole life in one piece and I honestly dislike that approach in case of (data) privacy.
After playing around with the new options I have to reconsider my opinion. The new profile option “Timeline” gives you a more advanced toolbox of managing your status update, posted links, user generated content. Especially when you lost the overview of your posts after a membership of 3-4 years, it could be necessary to review your own history. In the old version without “timeline” it´s so tough to manage your profile and archive because you honestly never go back than more of 15-20 older posts.
Right now you can make up your Facebook profile “room” to have it nice and tidy. You can easily ”clean-up” your profile and keep it really updated.
I am positively surprised and appreciate the new Facebook.
The empire strikes back!
Google´s Icecream Sandwich, Apple´s iOS 5.0 and Microsoft Windows Phone that is what we´ve got so far.
But I guess we can expect some great developments from Redmond as pressure is increasing onto MS Corp. mobile business. WP 7GA was just recently announced and Mango, Tango and Apollo will follow to sharpen the mobile footprint of the company.
The ecosystem develops further and further, not only by the cloud and cloud services. The whole integrated/connected solution. Anytime. Anywhere. And most of the market players don´t know tomorrows competition. Would it be Facebook? Would it be Amazon? Yesterday was the cloud. Tomorrow it will be the television. Entering the living rooms. But only the next move.
Forget about the “i”?
Some great news from this years LeWeb2011.
Eric Schmidt about social, local and mobile.
(c) LeWeb
All your x-mas gifts ready?
Today: smart x-mas sale level three. After Apple is pushing x-mas sales so far in two directions by iPhone 4s and iPad 2 messages into several consumer touchpoints it seems to be that Apple is introducing today the major x-mas product No. 3: the MacBook Air.
So iPhone, iPad and MacBookAir are making it´s way under the christmas tree.
Whilst Microsoft and Nokia are pushing Windows Phone and the Lumia 800. The timing of Googorola is also quite smart to introduce the new Motorola RAZR exactly for the x-mas sales period. In my eyes a really smart move.
I guess this is the start for a very though battle in 2012 for these kind of products. I promise you a new device and manufacturer ranking. Happy consumers – guaranteed!
iMessage: “What is next?”
iPad 3 and iPhone 5 rumors are already out there. I guess Foxconn and Pegatron are already preparing themselves for the official launch, even after Apple has increased its order for X-Mas/Q4 sales – especially on iPhone 4s largely. Despite the fact that some market players have corrected their sales forecast with less sold units due to the economic downstream in some regions. Some experts have said that Apple could not continue their smartphone success story, as Android´s market position is getting stronger and stronger. Honestly: it seems to be that Apple is probably not the world´s best smartphone, but it´s beloved user-friendly eco-systems still drives the highest profit margins to Cupertino. Which was a 40,3% in this Q4 in Apple´s fiscal year 2011.
One is enough, two is too much, three is dangerous!
Facebook, Twitter, Google+? Is three at least one too much?
Who is next? Who would die? Where is it going the social network eco-system?
1st = as long as there was only one, the world was easy to handle for all of us users. Everybody was happy just to increase fans & followers and to post user generated content or links, vids and stuff
2nd = after a little education, getting common and increased functionality knowledge consumers intent to have multiple accounts for different activities in their life (e.g. private, business, fake, junk and testing/more)
3rd = with more (cross)-related-Apps running on those social media plattforms for extended services such as foursquare, yipit, instagram, rating functions and more the complexity of handling your posts, status and contents starts to driving you nuts. Every single one of them! And that is only your part of the story and your perspective. How to handle this on different accounts simultaneously?
Beside all that you will never find all your contacts on one of these platforms. Maybe nearly all on Facebook, but you still have people who are reluctant and unconvinced to join this garden party. So at the end you still need your Phonebook/Outlook/Mac contacts database to ensure interaction with all your social contacts via Phone and Mail. And this shows as long as potential competitor Google+ will not have critical mass of users combined with permanent/regular user interaction Facebook will still be the No.1 and the major place to be! Even if you dislike the forthcoming Timeline-Feature, as I do. But just for a single moment, just a twinkle in the eye: what is next? Intelligent Search with recommendations that are cross-checked and combined with your Friends ratings and tailor made for you? The timeline function – everything compressed in a story of your life? Your individual One-click online Store of your favourite brands? TV, Books and Games online based on your likes? Woo-hoo.
And: will the giant Microsoft get the job done? Sync/Cloud, mobile OS and Social Media? Imagine: from about 95% of every online connections that have been operated with Microsoft Windows OS a few years ago to nearly under 50% this year. Every second internet connection to the internet is without Windows OS. Forecast: still decreasing. Thank you, smartphones and tablets.
All you Innovators, Early Adopters, Early Majority, Late Majority and Laggards – where do you follow in the future?
Six ways to save the internet.
A really great lecture from Roger McNamee!
(c) TEDxSantaCruz