business & innovation

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Who would like to be in a market whose device base is larger than the currently installed base of PCs and is set to grow by 4.5 times in the next 3 years?

I attended the Mobile Cloud Computing Forum last week thanks to Chinwag (apologies for the delay in posting this - Ed), and these predictions, based on a
Gartner paper made me sit up and listen.

There are currently close to 5 billion mobile phones in the world, this is going to rise to 6 billion in 2013. In 2013 there will be 1.82 billion smartphones on the planet, up from 400 million today, and surpassing the 1.78 billion PCs predicted for then.

Advertising globally is worth some $368 billion with $1 billion being spent on mobile. This is set to rise to $30 billion in 2013. Machine to machine communication has a potential for up to 60 billion devices. This market is yet to take off but does have some interesting applications within vending, gaming and smart monitoring, so one to watch for the future.

Google's One Pass hurriedly graduated yesterday from University in Berlin hot on the heels of the announcement of Apple's subscription service.

The online content payment platform is available to publishers in the UK, US, Canada, France, Italy, Germany and Spain. The subscription billing application will be making its way onto smart phones, tablets and computers in the UK, mainland Europe and the States now.

How it works?

Readers who purchase content from a One Pass publisher can access their content on tablets, smart phones and websites after signing in with their Gmail email and password.

A new initiative announced by the Technology Strategy Board (TSB), sees the launch of IC tomorrow, a platform for content owners and app developers to test drive ideas and applications with a closed group of consumers (sign-up here) using content from major content owners including Sony Music, Getty Images and Crytek.

The platform will host 20 consumer trials focused on the creative industries including music, TV/film and publishing, with a total fund of £200,000 up for grabs to support six month-long trials on the platform. Entrepreneurs are being encouraged to use the platform which will also include mentoring, as well as up to £10,000 per project funding and access to premium content.

Congratulations to the 31 leading UK digital companies that have been selected for this year's UK Trade & Investment (UKTI) Mission to SXSW Interactive 2011.

This trip will see the companies travel out to Austin, Texas for a five day trip in and around South by South West Interactive, one of the largest conferences focused on digital media and technology.

Each of the companies is listed below, don't hesitate to drop them a line directly to arrange a time to meet up in Austin, or follow their progress via their Twitter accounts below. You can follow the UKTI team's coverage of the mission on Twitter @uktiatsxswi.

UKTI SXSW 2011 Mission Companies

• Acunu Ltd
• Brandwatch
• Casual Films
• Completely Novel
• Cyber-Duck
• DAD Solutions
• Digital Outlook Communications
• East London Productions
• Engage Sciences
• Fortune Cookie
• Fly Post
• Get-ctrl Limited
• Glass Eye Productions
• Lingo24
• Minute Box
• MOFILMS
• MoodShare
• Namaste Entertainment
• Parcel Genie
• Planzai
• Psonar
• Rummble Labs
• Screenreach Interactive
• Shout’em
• Somethin’else
• Teamly
• The Play Mob
• w00t!media
• We are Social
• WhoSampled.com
• Zkatter

A key mistake made by brands when they first enter the social sphere is to forget that they’ll need a way to measure the tangible success of their efforts. Effectively brands leave themselves unable to measure the ROI of their social activity and as a result it can very easily become a wasted effort.

When you first engage through sites such as Facebook or Twitter it’s very easy to be fooled into thinking that a million online followers is an end to itself, but if you haven’t at the very least considered a future strategy for turning your new online friends (followers and fans) into *real* customers, it’s highly unlikely to happen on its own.

Just as with any other marketing campaign, clear objectives should be set right from the start that can be clearly measured and analysed in order to tell you exactly how successful your activities have been.