Steve Ballmer takes a dig at Google Android

You’ve got to give it to Steve Ballmer. He has the knack to say something which makes the whole world sit up and take notice. Speaking at the Telstra annual investor briefing in Sydney yesterday, Ballmer said that Google is not a major mobile competitor for Microsoft at all.

Ballmer said that Google is not very high on the list of Microsoft’s mobile competitors and it will not pose a threat to Microsoft’s dominance in the mobile market anywhere in the near future. Speaking of Google’s mobile division, he had these exact words to say – “They’ve got some smart guys and hire a lot of people — blah-di-blah-di-blah.”

Ballmer said that since Google has made Android free for everyone, they will not invest a lot to improve the product. He also stated that he couldn’t see how Google plans to make money from Android, since the product has no viable revenue model at all.

While I cannot disagree with most of the things he has said about Google, I have to disagree with one thing – the revenue model. Let me explain why.

Google never planned to make money from Android by charging people to use it. It was, is, and always will remain a free mobile platform. What Google thought of was a stronghold in the mobile OS market through Android, which I don’t think will be unachievable if Google continues to improve its product. Though it will not be possible in the near future thanks to the immense competition from Symbian, Blackberry, and Apple, you cannot rule out that possibility.

Most importantly, Google is not a mobile OS manufacturer. Its strength is advertising and by pushing more and more people around the world to use Android, Google can easily show a lot more ads and generate a lot of revenue – a fact that Ballmer seems to have forgotten.

As someone who has always wanted to ‘bury’ Google, Ballmer has made his intentions clear. Though he clearly said “I’m not giving them a hard time”, it is exactly what he has tried to do. It will be interesting to see Google’s response, if at all Larry and Sergey bother to respond. What do you think?

Categories: Google, Microsoft.

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Mobile web to be worth $16 billion in 2011

Apparently, some people are confused as to why there is so much fuss about mobile web. Well; the short answer is - $16 billion.

1. Analysts say that mobile web will be worth a whopping $16 billion in just three years from now. Now, a $16 billion market is something that is too big for even giants like Google and Yahoo to be taken lightly.

2. Also, the size of the mobile phone market is three times bigger than the size of the web market. In other words, there are three mobile phone users for one PC user. Now, where do you see more opportunities?

3. Apple iPhone, in more ways than one, changed the landscape of the mobile world. Since its arrival, mobile internet usage has increased as most of the iPhone users regularly surf the net from their phone. Add more high-end phones like Nokia N95, Blackberry, and other such smart phones to the equation and you have the perfect recipe for a mobile web revolution.

4. With 3G and 3.5G networks, high speed mobile browsing is very much possible for mobile users. This will significantly increase the number of mobile web users in the future.

Hence, the excitement.

While Google is busy with Android, Yahoo has been silently working its way to the top. Both these companies have kept people guessing what would be their next move in the mobile world for quite some time now. In my opinion, Yahoo has a slight edge over Google as it’s already set its foot firmly in the mobile market. However, if Android could do to Google what the iPhone did for Apple, we’d be looking at a completely different situation. Either way, the competition is going to be interesting to watch.

Categories: Mobile Web.

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Will newspapers go mobile?

Websites are trying to reinvent themselves by going mobile. Corporations are trying to reinvent themselves by going mobile. Advertisers are trying to reinvent themselves by going mobile. Banks are trying to reinvent themselves by going mobile. What’s next on the list? Newspapers, they say.

When you look at the current scenario, it looks like an obvious transition for newspapers. The circulation is declining by the day as people are more and more getting used to the content available on the internet and the mobile phone. In this case, newspapers hardly have a choice.

Fortunately, the bigwigs of the newspaper world have realized the need for this transition. Already, we have seen Associated Content launch its mobile portal and I have no doubt it will be followed by other news networks. The writing is on the wall. With 3.3 billion active users, mobile market is the biggest market there is. Realizing this, U.S. mobile carriers have invested an astonishing $40 billion to retool themselves according to the new mobile age.

Currently, more than 30% of mobile users surf the internet on their mobile phone. The number is rapidly rising as new mobile users these days mostly go for web enabled mobile phones. With this being the case, newspapers have to find a way to get into the mobile phone at any cost.

The newspaper, fortunately, is almost tailor made for a medium like mobile phone. The specialty of newspapers lies in their ability to provide local content, which is exactly what mobile users want. The more local your data is, the better it will be for the users, since most of them use their mobile phone to find out local information like weather, local events, and so on. So, the transition will be seamless, so to speak. When newspapers go mobile, it will also mean a huge opportunity for mobile advertisers to be able to display highly targeted ads along with the local news content.

What needs to be done – this everyone seems to know. When will it get done? That’s the question. Don’t you agree?

Categories: All things mobile phones, Mobile Web.

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A closer look at AdMob

Ever since I started to blog about mobile advertising, I’ve blogged about a lot of mobile advertising companies. Yet, some stand out distinctly. One such company is AdMob.

Sure, there are other mobile advertising companies which have been successful in their own right. But still, AdMob is unique in the sense that it has become a market leader in a short period of time.

AdMob, which started off as a small startup with just one staff, has now become a huge success and has served over a whopping 20 billion ads all over the world. On an average, AdMob serves around 3 billion mobile ads. Its founder, Omar Hamoui, is confident that the company will see new highs in the next few years, as mobile advertising industry is predicted to grow enormously by 2012.

AdMob specializes in sending targeted mobile ads to users based on a variety of things like geographical location, preferences, type of handset, and more. Surprisingly, this process is almost entirely automated. AdMob has a gazillion mobile websites as publishers under its belt and enjoys a big market share. However, things will not be the as easy in the future.

Big names like Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, AOL, and Nokia have been eyeing the mobile advertising space for quite some time now and have entered the market with their own service. The competition is going to be fierce and it remains to be seen if AdMob could tackle this monstrous competition.

However, when questioned about the competition in the mobile advertising market, Omar Hamoui simply smiles and says that it will be an interesting battle and it will be easier for a small company like AdMob to adapt to the ever-changing mobile market than it will be for the big names. That, I think, is what you call confidence. What do you say?

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising.

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Google to introduce its mobile advertising service in China

After its successful mobile advertising deal with Japan’s topmost mobile carrier, Google is all set to sign a similar deal in China. Google has officially announced that it will soon launch a mobile advertising service which will cover mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.

While Google has made it clear that it will be partnering with Far EasTone and Chunghwa Telecom in Taiwan, it has not said anything about its partnerships in mainland China.

Chinese mobile market is considered one of the fastest growing markets in the world and Google has stepped into it with great expectations. It remains to be seen if this deal can turn out to be as successful as the one it signed in Japan with NTT DoCoMo.

Categories: Cell Phone Advertising, Google.

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