The website of Alex Kinch, live from London
Posts tagged Mobile Applications
MoZoop launches free phone book transfer app
Nov 16th
Nottingham-based MoZoop think they’ve found the reason why most people don’t upgrade their mobiles very often – the thought of losing all your contacts. To combat this, they’ve launched a new contact transfer service.
The free online service allows you to ‘zoop’ your contacts from your old handset and ‘zoop’ them to a new one. It promises to be – easy to use – taking just five steps, and compatible with most phones.
According to Neil Kilbride, Lead Developer for MoZoop, “Many people struggle to get their valuable contacts onto their new phone, instantly creating a disappointing experience and making the new phone suddenly seem less exciting and usable”.
“We’ve launched MoZoop as a free service simply because we think that it’s so useful – it fixes a real problem for thousands of users and we want as many people as possible to be able to use it,” Kilbride continued.
To ‘zoop’ your contacts visit http://www.mozoop.com
Clickatell to Provide Global SMS Delivery Services for mFoundry’s Three Mode Mobile Banking Solution
Jun 2nd
Clickatell, the world’s leading global messaging company, today announced that Clickatell’s SMS messaging and gateway services will be used by mFoundry to enable Text Banking message delivery for mFoundry’s three-mode mBanking product. mFoundry offers the most complete solution in the market with integrated SMS, WAP, and mobile applications including native support for iPhone and iPod Touch. Clickatell’s carrier grade mobile messaging service, which currently supports over 8,300 customers, will provide Text Banking SMS messaging delivery for mFoundry’s mBanking product.
Jacob Jegher, senior analyst in Celent’s Banking Group, commented, “It is a very exciting time in mobile banking. Soon, people around the world will be using their mobile phone in place of their wallet. We’re already seeing many forms of text banking–including SMS receipts, mobile alerts, money transfers, balance checks, and more–in the US and especially in other regions where people have become accustomed to banking anywhere, anytime.
“SMS plays an essential role in delivering compelling mobile banking services across every segment of interest to financial institutions everywhere,” said Pieter de Villiers, CEO of Clickatell. “In our experience, mobile text banking sets a new standard of customer convenience and value by leveraging the popularity of text messaging to reach and improve the financial lives of the masses. We are proud to work with mFoundry, a company that continues to lead and guide this fast moving mobile banking market.”
“Clickatell was the only messaging company in the space that started specifically to deliver enterprise level solutions, which ensures banks the highest reliability and security as well as the lowest latency possible. In fact, they have the highest deliverability rate in the industry,” said mFoundry CEO and co-founder, Drew Sievers. “Clickatell offers access to more than twice the carrier connections of the nearest competitor, which gives our regional and community bank customers a higher level of coverage than any other text banking provider.”
Clickatell offers a complete enterprise messaging solution including a robust messaging platform and global messaging delivery. Clickatell was recently awarded “2009 Cool Vendor in Mobile and Wireless” by a leading analyst firm and was also acknowledged as “Best Value Product” from Mobile industry Review. Clickatell’s commitment to the financial services industry has resulted in major global wins with customers such as FNB, Standard Bank, Moneybookers, RSA, the Security Division of EMC, New Heights, and Fortis Micro Finance Banks, Metropolitan Insurance, S1 Corporation, Postilion, and more.
Orange mobile data usage rockets by 4,125%
May 14th
Mobile operator Orange have unveiled their fifth Digital Media Index – and revealed dongle data usage has increased by 4,125% in the past twelve months.
In addition to the rather impressive usage of its data dongle products, the company also revealed dongle subscriptions have risen by 504% over the past year. Handset mobile browsing has also shot up – by 109%. That brings the monthly total data usage to a rather giddy 386,000 Gigabytes.
So what exactly are people using all this data for? According to Orange, music and video downloads have both increased by 38%, with social networking sites showing a 129% increase in monthly page impressions and 48% increase in monthly unique users.
Paul Jevons, Director of Products, Portals and Services for Orange, said: “The Orange Digital Media Index shows that the ‘mobile data era’ has truly arrived. Customers are repeatedly enjoying the intuitive and seamless mobile internet experience to access a greater quantity and quality of content that is designed specifically for the mobile portal – whether that’s music, videos or games – helping to drive consumer traffic. An explosion in the number of mobile applications and new embedded laptops will boost mobile data demand even further in the coming months.
“We’ve seen an enormous increase in data usage across all our entertainment and communication services, including internet, email, multimedia messaging, music downloads, photo uploads, and gaming. It is clear that innovative, exciting and accessible content for the mobile platform is increasing the popularity of mobile services which are embedded on handsets or downloaded through applications stores.”
Freemium Model to Predominate in Mobile Apps with VAS revenues Reaching $14bn by 2014, says new Juniper report
May 13th
Annual revenues from value-added services upsold through downloaded apps are expected to exceed $14bn by 2014, according to a new report from Juniper Research.
The report found that storefronts are increasingly likely to offer the facility to upsell premium content from within the app itself (including the App Store, starting later this year). The result being that the freemium business model – whereby applications are offered on a free to download basis but subsequently offer incremental revenues from subscription-based services and additional content options – will become increasingly prevalent over the next five years.
However, the mobile applications report also observed that widespread deployment of the freemium apps model would pose a significant challenge to network operators, given that it offers the opportunity for much existing (and potential) content revenues to be directed through app stores (and the apps themselves) rather than through traditional distribution channels.
Nevertheless, as report author Dr Windsor Holden noted, “Although consumers are likely to shift from purchasing content on-portal to app stores offered by vendors and OS providers, those stores in turn represent an opportunity for operators to realise far greater revenues from consumer data usage.”
The report argues that apps delivered on a freemium basis presents a substantial opportunity for content providers to derive additional revenues from advertising. The levels of repeat usage from applications downloaded via the App Store suggests that there is far more opportunity for brand exposure on a per download basis than with any previous content.
Other findings from the Juniper report include:
• The low retail prices offered by Apple’s App Store have already resulted in significant price erosion on other established storefronts
• Short-term revenue growth from consumer-oriented applications is likely to be constrained by the global recession
Juniper Research assesses the current and future status of the mobile applications market based on interviews, case studies and analysis from representatives of some of the leading organisations in the growing mobile applications industry.
Top-selling Windows Mobile app goes 3.0
Apr 21st
Spb Mobile Shell, the next-generation Windows mobile user interface, is now available in a new 3.0 version.
The software, which according to Handago yardstick was the world’s number one bestselling application of 2008 among all mobile platforms, gives users the ability to switch between ‘work’ and ‘play’ desktop, integration of picture contacts with Facebook, account-sensitive email indicators, handsome time and weather screens, widgets, responsive kinetic scrolling, signature 3D animation engine, and other appealing assets that change the way a Windows phone is used altogether.
“It was challenging to design 3.0, as customer expectations are quite high,” comments Yaroslav Goncharov the Spb Mobile Shell Product Manager and CTO at Spb Software. “On the other hand, this level of success gave us confidence in our basic ideas and design philosophy, and we certainly feel that Spb Mobile Shell 3.0 has all it takes to be the strong foundation for a host of new and immensely popular Windows phones.”
Spb Mobile Shell 3.0 is compatible with Windows phones running Windows Mobile 5 and later Professional platforms, qVGA, VGA, Square QVGA, and WVGA screen resolutions are supported. A free, 15-day trial can be downloaded, or Spb Mobile Shell can be purchased for 29.95 USD from http://www.spbsoftwarehouse.com/.
Palringo nominated for Webby Award
Apr 17th
Clever multi-platform IM client/service Palringo has been nominated in the Best Use of GPS or Location Technology category in the 13th Annual Webby Awards. Hailed as the “internet’s highest honour” by the New York Times, the Webby Awards is the leading international award honouring excellence on the Internet.
“Webby nominees set the standard for innovation and creativity on the Internet,” said David-Michel Davies, executive director of the Webby Awards. “It is an incredible achievement to be selected among the best from the nearly 10,000 entries we received this year.”
Palringo’s founder and CTO Martin Rosinski said: “Being shortlisted for a Webby Award is a sure signal to our users and customers that the outstanding location functionality we’ve built into Palringo is at the leading edge of what’s currently possible and useful in a messaging service.”
Nomination also makes Palringo eligible to win a Webby People’s Voice Award, voted for online by the global Web community. From now until April 30th, all admirers of Palringo can cast their votes in The Webby People’s Voice Awards at http://pv.webbyawards.com.
Sun Dial uses mobile phones to alert Muslims to prayer
Apr 6th
Sun Dial is a mobile application that uses images to alert users to the five daily prayers of Islam.
Religious technology may seem like an oxymoron, but as more people obtain mobile phones, iPhones and other devices to help them manage their lives, it’s only natural that many of them will be using their gadgets to help them enrich their spiritual life as well. Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have developed a mobile application known as Sun Dial, which alerts Muslim users when it’s time to perform the five daily prayers known as salat. The device is currently being discussed this week at the human-computer interaction conference, CHI, in Boston.
“We have to understand religion because it’s such a central part of peoples lives,” explained Susan Wyche, doctoral candidate in the College of Computing and GVU Center at Georgia Tech. More >
Microsoft to demo app store at CTIA
Apr 1st
Windows Marketplace for Mobile - Applications List
Things seem to come in two’s lately – hot on the heels of RIM’s launch of the BlackBerry app store, Microsoft have done a bit of a ‘me too’ press blitz to remind everyone they’ve got something similar in the pipeline.
Although Windows Marketplace for Mobile won’t hit the streets until later this year, that’s not going to stop Microsoft’s Robbie Bach discussing their plans for the store and demonstrating how it’ll all work at CTIA on Thursday.
via Microsoft to take mobile Marketplace for test drive | CTIA show – CNET Reviews.
BlackBerry app store goes live
Apr 1st
BlackBerry maker Research In Motion (RIM) have just launched their new app store for the device – rather ingeniously called ‘BlackBerry App World’. Available immediately to BlackBerry users in the UK, US and Canada – with more countries to follow – App World aims to offer broad mix of personal and business applications for users to discover.
“The BlackBerry platform provides a truly unparalleled mobile experience for millions of people and we are thrilled today to enhance that experience with a new app store that helps connect consumers with developers and carriers,” said Mike Lazaridis, President and Co-CEO. “BlackBerry App World aggregates a wide variety of personal and business apps in a way that makes it very easy for consumers to discover and download the apps that suit them while preserving the appropriate IT architecture and controls required by our enterprise customers.”
RIM expect around 1,000 applications to go live on the service this week, including applications from content partners such as Bloomberg, New York Times, salesforce.com, MTV Networks and Lonely Planet.
Have Yahoo! tamed the social networking holy grail?
Mar 31st
So many social networking services, so many apps – and only so much your poor mobile (and brain) can handle at once if you want access to all of them on the move. However, this might be about to change if Yahoo! have their way.
The Yahoo! OneConnect app, which is expected to launch in the UK in Q2, can be downloaded onto your phone and is compatible with Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Bebo and other social networks.
By using the app you’ll be able to see the latest Tweets on Twitter, alongside images that your friends have recently uploaded on Flickr and even messages left on your wall on Facebook, all without having to navigate to the different sites.
via @NorthLondon and Yahoo unveils new social networking mobile app News – PC Advisor.
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