Skip to main content

What I've been reading this week


I’m of the belief that participants in the TMT industry need to read widely in order to understand the present and future dynamics of the market. To that end, this (short) post is a collection of the articles that have caught my eye in the last week.

This week: smartphones vs magazines at the checkout; Spotify vs Netflix in video and Yahoo! pays $30m for a 17 year old.

Media

Shoppers aren’t reading magazines anymore because they check their phone in the checkout queue. Interesting social observation!

Spotify planning to go toe to toe with Netflix in online video. Makes sense. In fact, I can see Spotify being good at it – I love the way they make commodity music into an experience. http://uk.appy-geek.com/Web/ArticleWeb.aspx?regionid=4&articleid=7784749

Nearly 90% of 18-24 year olds check their smartphone within 15 minutes of waking up; 75% check it immediately. I suspect the same applies to us oldies as well – I always have at least one in easy reach. https://fb-public.box.com/s/3iq5x6uwnqtq7ki4q8wk

EA says that 50% of game sales will be download-to-own by 2015. Two barriers: there is a healthy secondary market for games, which is important to cash strapped (young) gamers; second, release windows often mean that the latest games aren’t available on download until sometime after the physical copy. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-27/electronic-arts-says-digital-games-will-be-50-of-sales-by-2015.html

Technology

I missed this in January, but recently got sent it. An e-ink watch, extremely thin and light. Amazing tech’ – could see it being useful in connected clothing or other wearable installations. http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/49170/cst-01-e-ink-watch-pictures-hands-on

Summly is an interesting technology, but the inference that Yahoo! is more interested in the creator and his access to the zeitgeist than the underlying application should be a worry to their shareholders. He’s a talented guy, but totally unproven in the long run. $30Mn is a lot to pay for talent. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-21924243

…and a reminder of just why Yahoo!’s ‘peanut butter’ strategy fails. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB116379821933826657-0mbjXoHnQwDMFH_PVeb_jqe3Chk_20061125.html

Business models

An interesting article on Walmart Labs. I can see other major companies following suit in the near future: technology is once again a business differentiator, rather than just a commodity. http://www.wired.com/business/2013/03/why-walmart-wants-to-be-a-startup/

Just for fun

1.43 minute video of Steve Jobs talking about his philosophy on life. He makes a really good point – everything in life and society was created by humans. We’re inherently flawed. Just because you do something different doesn’t make it wrong: it might be a better way to live. Within reason, of course… http://www.farnamstreetblog.com/2013/03/steve-jobs-the-most-important-thing/

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Impacts of a handset leasing model on mobile telcos

Following yesterday's post, here's some related thinking on the impacts on operators of handset leasing. Handset sales represent around 25% of operator revenues in a typical European market, but generate only around 5% of margin. It may therefore be the case that the scenario described would lead operators to a more profitable structural model than exists today. Oil companies are consistently and acceptably profitable, despite being (literally in some cases) the ‘dumb pipe’ that operators are so desperate to avoid becoming. One of the reasons for the oil majors sustained profitability is clear focus on their role in the value chain – to supply the fuel that enables transportation, relying primarily on location, then brand and finally product innovation to compete. BP or Shell do not need to subsidise the purchase of a car in order to drive consumption of fuel because consumers are ‘hooked’ on it (it gets them from place to place) and there are many credible car manufacturers an...

Differences between Industrial and Digital businesses

Since I'm stuck on a Eurostar crawling through western France I thought I'd use the downtime to share this table I've made on the differences between Industrial and Digital companies across the main business functions. A strange insight into how my mind works... but hopeful a useful summary!

Value drivers for telecoms retail

I've been doing a really large number of driver trees recently - we've taken to using them on every project to get really into the guts of value creation for businesses and thus decide where to focus initiative development (How To Win, if you're keeping score). Anyhow, I had to pause for thought recently to work out how to represent the subscription aspect of telecoms retail for a client. Since it took me a minute, I thought I'd share... its lack of elegance suggests that its not quite right, although it was enough to demonstrate that there was a certain lack of coverage in the initiatives that my client was pursuing and thus spark a debate. Enjoy.