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Why Does Apple Not Develop Its Own Search Engine For Safari Browser?

By
Abhishek Singh
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0
Search Engine on Safari Browser

Google is an internet search company, and an advertising revenue from AdWords accounts  for almost all of the company’s profit. Google is neither a phone company nor targeting to enterprise customers. The company is basically known for developing mind-boggling web-related products such as Chrome, Gmail, Google Docs or Google Map. While on the other side, Apple manufactures a sequence of high-profile products including iPods, iPads, iPhone, Mac lineups and more.

Apple has its own web browser called Safari, but it uses Google as the default search engine on its browser. According to a new report from the analyst firm Morgan Stanley,  Google pays Apple roughly $1 billion every year as per an agreement for making Google as default search engine on the Safari browser for iOS devices. An analyst at Macquarie Capital has estimated that Google was making $1.3 billion in paid search revenue from iOS devices as of March 2012.

There’re numbers of questions that anonymously arise in the mind. First, why isn’t Apple teaming up with Microsoft for ‘Bing’ as default search engine instead of Google? There might be an option that Apple would develop its own search engine for Safari Browser. But this time, the company is unwilling to develop any such search engine. In addition, users in the world’s largest mobile handset market–China–doesn’t care much about Google search engine on their smartphones.  However, inside the country, Google is still going through questionable relationship with the Chinese government.

More importantly, Google is also expected to pay around $300 million this year as traffic acquisition cost to Mozilla for making Google as the default search engine for Firefox. However, for the companies like Google and Apple, $1 billion isn’t a big deal; for them, it’s just like a drop of water in the ocean. But the question is why Google is so much interested in Apple’s iOS devices? Actually, Google leverages on Apple’s devices for collecting data what iOS users are searching for, and it uses these information for further improvisation of its search engine. Besides, it also sells these information to advertisers at premium price.  It’s believed that Google made 80% of its mobile ad revenues from iOS devices during 2008-11. At present, Google search engine alone accounted for 92% of mobile search share as of June last year.

search engine

Recently, Google unleashed its Nexus 4 ad during the Grammy event, highlighting voice intelligent based “Google Now” searches. In other words, the company wants to suppress the influence of Apple’s voice recognition based searching application (Siri). Watch the below video for better understanding:

httpv://youtu.be/SpaLZOjqMew

Anyway, Apple is currently aggressive not to use Google’s any product in its devices. The company is mainly afraid with the data collection, which happens behind the device screen, and this might be one of the reasons why Apple dropped YouTube and Google Map from iOS 6 devices.

In terms of mobile web traffic generation, Apple’s iPhone and iPad are currently quite ahead of any Android device. And this is the main reason why Google wants to continue its relationship with Apple on iOS platform. First time, Google and Apple signed up an agreement for the default search engine on the PC version of Safari Browser in 2003. But this time, Apple is endeavoring to make Siri into a full-fledged search engine.

In fact, it’s really tough for any new entrant or even existing player to compete with Google in search engine space–either on larger screen device like PC or small screen mobile devices. Microsoft saddled its all efforts on Bing to dwindle Google’s halo effect, but upshots came in the favor of Google. Apparently, Apple is knowing the fact that it couldn’t defeat Google in search engine space. In addition, it’s also generating $1 billion every year from Google. But the company (Apple) is trying to leverage on Siri as an alternative option.

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Smartphone Market In India Is Dominated By Android With 62%: Almost 50% Users Are Under 25 Years [Report]

By
Abhishek Singh
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0

Over the last couple of years, smartphones have seen staggering growth in emerging markets especially in India and China. In India, smartphones have now become one of the dominating trends. Till the end of last year, there were approximately 40 million smartphones in the country. A desire among Indian users to stay connected with social networking sites on their mobile device has boosted to smartphone adoption in the country.

According to a study conducted by Nielsen and Informate Mobile Intelligence–an amalgamation of Nielsen and Informate Mobile Intelligence–on 10,000 consumers between September and October 2012 across 46 major Indian cities to access overall usage and device preference, 93% of smartphone owners are using their device for single source of infotainment on-the-go.

Availability of low-priced smartphones with wide range of features and cheaper data plans being offered by carriers are encouraging consumers to make purchase of the devices. At present, Android is the most popular mobile OS among smartphone users in India; 62% of smartphone mobile OS market share was dominated by Android during Sept-October 2012. It’s clear that smartphone users in India are likely to opt the platforms those are open and available across multiple brands with variant price tags. However, Symbian is still second prevalent smartphone OS in the country, despite of Nokia’s decision to go with Windows Phone platform.  On the other side, mobile OS platforms such as Windows Phone, BlackBerry and iOS  are still struggling with single-digit market share.

Mobile OS market share In India

Like smartphone, adoption of tablet in India is also increasing with dizzying pace. We have already mentioned that the country recorded 673% Y/Y growth in Q2 2012—thanks to cheap Android-powered tablets, manufactured by local vendors like Micromax and others, which fueled the device shipments across the country. As per the Nielsen’s latest study, consumers interest in tablets is likely to mount up. However, only 3% of respondents (those  participated in the study) owned tablets, but 11% were willing to get their hand on a tablet. It has also been noticed from the study that consumers are spending notably more time (about one hour more) on their tablet compare to their Android smartphones.

smartphone users in India

In India, smartphone user are willing to pay for game and chat music apps. Still, voice calls and texting account for 25% of smartphone usage.

mobile apps purchase in India

Games is the most popular category among paid apps; nearly three out of five users (58%) are paying for games. Furthermore, chat/instant messaging and streaming music are accounting for 53% and 45% of all popular paid app categories. Breaking out to some  facts, millions of smartphone users still don’t have access to mobile internet connectivity. Interestingly, half the number of the smartphone users polled (during Sept-Oct 2012) had active data access on their mobile device. However, the proportion of such users was significantly higher than the proportion of feature phone users.

It’s quite worthy to know that Indian youths are very active to adopt data connectivity on their smartphones. The study revealed that more than half of all data users are under 25 years.

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Brands On Facebook Are Socially Devoted Than Ever !! [Report]

By
Shilpa Shree
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0

In order to be successful in social media marketing, marketers must be socially dedicated too, say researchers at SocialBakers.com. Their latest Socially devoted report and corresponding infographic shows that brands on Facebook have increased their speed and volume when responding to fan interactions with their Company Page. SocialBakers reports have reported some interesting facts about Q4 2012 findings.

The report observed that, volume of questions posted to Facebook has increased by 26% from Q2 to Q4 2012. Interestingly, average brand response time on Facebook is now 13.7 hours, compared to 20.9 hours in Q2 2012. Also, brands answer 55% of questions posed to them on Facebook; in the second quarter of 2012, only 30% were answered. And, Airlines, finance and telecom remain the three most responsive industries, though their positions have shifted since Q2 2012.

facebook_response rate

“In the last year, there has been a shift away from brands simply seeking to collect the highest number of fans. What is important is how you interact and how you serve them,” said Jan Rezab, CEO of SocialBakers.com.

Social devotion is measured using a number of factors, including how the Facebook page is set up, whether brands respond to fan questions at least 65% of the time, and the rate of response time.

Also, alcohol saw +506.5% of improvement in its response rate compared to Q2 2012. In another report from socialbakers observed that, Facebook Pages which included health and alcohol saw the greatest gains in terms of fans. Alcohol saw 13% (20,000) average fan growth and was the second fastest growing industry on Facebook.

Health, electronics and alcohol showed highest growth of fan counts from July through September in 2012. Health saw up 19% and alcohol and electronics saw up 13%.  In addition, health industry was at the first position in the relative growth by number of fans with 19% (14,000 new fans) and net increase of pages in industry by 28% that is up 54 new pages.

In addition, automotive industry recorded 477.2% improvement in terms of response rate compared to Q2 2012 while, average page size by number of fans was increased by just 7% in last September 2012.

Facebook response rate improvemnt from Q2-Q4

Fashion industry which saw, just 12% net increase of new pages in industry in September 2012 is now in the fourth position in terms of response rate. Retail and telecom industries are showing negligible rate of response to the consumers by 26.8% and 17.5% respectively.

Another study on Social Devotion observed that, 61% of Facebook users say at some point, they’ve taken a voluntary break from using Facebook for several weeks or more. Of those who took this Facebook-vacation, 21% of the respondents said that they had a lack of time for Facebook. Other top reasons were a lack of interest in the site itself, a feeling that it was a waste of time or the content was not relevant, and too much drama, gossip, negativity has made them take a break. While, Just 4% reported they’d taken a break due to concerns about privacy, spam, or advertising.

While breaks from Facebook may seem an interesting trend, the effect on brands should be negligible. Facebook’s latest earnings report shows a 25% increase in monthly active users and 28% more daily active users, compared to the same period in 2011.

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With 400% Growth In 3 Months “iPhone On Installments” Is Working Out For Apple In India !

By
Dazeinfo
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0

It seems that Apple is finally heading towards striking gold in India – world’s second largest mobile market. According to the recent IDC report, sales of Apple devices – especially iPhone – have gone up by 400% in last 3 months. All this is due to Apple’s revamped strategy and diverted focused approach towards Indian mobile market since the launch of iPhone 5.

Apple was already sold to Indians as a premium brand. However, due to cost sensitive nature of the market, mobile users stayed away from such hefty investment especially when Samsung is adopting aggressive marketing campaigns to beat competitors.

Apple took detour to launch iPhone 5 in India by ditching Network providers and making the phone available in open market – copying the lesson learned from Chinese market. Redington and Ingram Micro, acting as distributors of iPhone now, relaxed the buying process by offering iPhone 4, iPhone 4S and iPhone 5 on easy monthly installments but very low upfront cost starting from Rs. 5,000 on-wards. Besides, both the companies have not only worked out aggressively but, also taken care of effective marketing and promotion strategies with multiple vendors and network operators. All this is resulting in massive turn out of users who are quite excited to find an iPhone in pocket by burning almost throw-away upfront cost.

Apple iPhone in India: Better Than Never

In the year 2012, more than 700 million Smartphones were sold. Interesting 3 out of every 4 Smartphone sold in Q3 2012 were powered by Android. After China, India is the biggest mobile market with close to 1 Billion mobile subscribers. Besides, the aggressive adoption of 3G and 4G networks is another important form of factor for companies like Samsung and Apple to have focused strategy in place.

Apple iPhone in India

In 2012, low-priced handsets registered the highest growth in India. The choice of Smartphone and model is highly influenced with income ability. People belonging to age group of 21 – 35 years are the most active and early adopters of Smartphone. Despite, the penetration (population) of Smartphone is just 2.72% – the lowest compare to other smaller size countries like Malaysia, Singapore, Greece, Taiwan. But, the trend is poised to change as people are becoming more demanding with their mobile devices; Mobile internet usage is all time high and average number of app downloads per users is also growing up with steady pace.

Apple is reportedly working on low-price iPhone, specially to crack the price-conservative markets like India. Undoubtedly, to survive in Indian mobile industry Apple will have to join the dirty price game and why not….. one just can’t do Apple to Apple comparison between two neighbors but almost different markets in terms of culture, behavior, laws, regulations, and most importantly, default cases of various loans.

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Submitting Your App To Apple App Store: Measures To Be Taken By Developers For Guaranteed Approval

By
Abhishek Singh
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0

We have already discussed why Apple App store is better than Google Play store in terms of security. At present, Apple App Store is committed to provide high-quality apps to users and protect them from the hostile apps. At present, the app store is enjoying more than 1 million approved apps. However, the actual number of apps is less than the approved number, as a significant number of developers have already removed their apps from Apple App store.

Furthermore, registration to Apple App Store is little-bit cumbersome compare to Google Play Store. Before submitting the apps to Apple App Store, developers have to go with number of procedures. It has been noticed that, the number of their apps get rejected by the app store is due to some sort of faults. Here, we are going to discuss some important measures that developers need to be followed before submitting apps to Apple App Store.

Are You Submitting Beta Version of Apps?

Google follows a standard algorithm for Beta launch services, which is considered as unfinished or yet to be prepared for the launch. For developers, it’s quite easy to submit Beta version of their apps to Google Play Store. On the other side, Apple is quite strict with these apps. This is reason why most of the apps are labeled as ‘Beta’, ‘preview’ or ‘version 0.9’ are rejected by the company’s app Store.

Developers Need to Take Care About Load Time of Apps:

Every mobile OS has its optimal start-up time for apps; for the iOS, the startup time limit for apps is 15 seconds.  By default, if any app takes more time (greater than limited startup time), the OS kills that app. However, developers generally test the apps on their local server or slower network connections. But it has been noticed that when they submit their apps to Apple App Store (while environment changes), the apps upload during the review process slows down, and finally, these apps are being killed by the apps store. It’s been advised to the developers that they shouldn’t rely only on iOS stimulator alone. They should keep testing on some other real hardware and few older versions of the iOS devices as well. Ensure whether or not it’s working properly. They should always keep one thing in mind that apps’ load time is the first step to impress users.

Apple App Store

Don’t Use Improper Icons and Buttons:

It’s also true that many of apps are being rejected due to improper UI issues. Before submitting the apps, developers need to ensure whether or not the built-in Apple icon and buttons are uniform; the icons and buttons should appear and function properly. In addition, developers also need to familiarize themselves with Apple App Store ‘human interface guidelines’.

Don’t Misuse The Apple’s Trademark And Logos:

It’s advised to developers that they shouldn’t use trademark  materials such as Apple icons or logos anywhere in their apps or as product images. There’re numbers of apps get denied everyday for having Apple’s trademark in their apps’ keyword.

Some Additional Measures:

It’s mandated by Apple to sell all digital contents through its built in iTunes based in-app purchasing mechanism, which provides one-time purchase as well as digital subscriptions. Apparently, some apps are rejected for violating the Apple’s in-app mechanism. Besides, developers shouldn’t mention other supported platforms, and they also shouldn’t use improper storage and file systems.

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Facebook To Challenge Google AdWords: Inking Deal With Microsoft To Acquire Ad Server !

By
Dazeinfo
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0

Yet another blow for Google ! Back in August last year we exposed Facebook-Microsoft Ad Server Deal (it was in early stage then) which is now in final stage. Facebook is reportedly inking the deal with Microsoft this week to venture into off-Facebook advertisement business by acquiring Atlas – an ad server Microsoft bought for $6.2 Billion back in 2007.

According to few industry executives, familiar with the deal; both the companies could sign-off anytime this week and Atlas would be controlled by Facebook to put exactly on the face of Google AdWords as a strong contender. Interestingly, Facebook is supposed to cough up less than $100 Million for Atlas as Microsoft could capitalize on the much-hyped acquisition of its time.

Since last year, Facebook has enormously focused and up-scaled itself in advertisement space by introducing various tools for advertisers – but confined into the Facebook network only.  With the upcoming acquisition Facebook could control end-to-end advertisements pipe which would allow advertisers to flex their arms beyond Facebook.

Only $100 Million: Something Fishy?

Many are suspecting over the deal due to the nature of acquisition style. Why would Microsoft sell off an asset, which could play a vital role in next few years, for $100 Million – attracting straight loss of more than $6 Billion?

Microsoft could possibly see this as an investment rather than loss due to vested interest in Facebook. For long, Microsoft has made various failed attempts to pull down Google AdWords market share – atleast in USA. Unfortunately, despite of all boom and bang, Microsoft failed to do so.

Facebook ad Server

On the other hand, Facebook has been setting up great performing quarters one after other since last year. With more than 1 Billion users in kitty Facebook could easily create lucrative advertising market for marketers by making ads reach beyond Facebook’s primary network. This will not only benefit Facebook but also Microsoft which is enjoying direct investment in Facebook. Besides, this could also boost up Bing market as a result of robust integration between Facebook, Bing and Facebook’s ad inventory.

Ad Server: Facebook’s Power Punch

Online advertisement revenue coming via Google AdWords contributes and controls the company’s financial performance. And, this time Facebook is planning to hit hard on Google’s core strength of revenue generation. If succeeded, Facebook not only eat up Google’s advertising revenue share but will also create a set-back for Google’s other services like AdSense.

Facebook started the year with the launch of “Graph Search” – being addressed as a direct challenger for Google Search by many industry analysts. Despite of being two different worlds in terms of nature of results, features and algorithm, Graph Search has all the ability to influence internet user’s requirements and decisions. Ultimately, a internet user wants more accurate, authentic, close to need result irrespective of source of origin.

Facebook is growing enormously. And, with such acceleration it could easily surpass Yahoo and Google in display advertisement revenue by 2015. The overall social media Ad revenue is expected to stay $8.3 Billion by 2015 and having the largest share of it; Facebook would enjoy equal benefit by then. By 2015, Facebook’s ad revenue by Desktop alone is expected to stand close to $4.50 Billion. And, if we consider the explosive adoption of Smartphone, the overall revenue figure for Facebook (Desktop + Mobile) is poised to grow further up – especially when Google is already struggling with Mobile Business revenue.

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Why Buying Twitter Followers Is Not Such A Waste Of Investment !

By
Guest Author
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0

Social Media is indeed a powerful source of information broadcast and discussion. However, over the period of existing, multiple flavors of it have segregated users based upon their needs and type of usage. The micro blogging social network Twitter has marked its presence and different sets of user’s altogether. People who are the most creative enough with words love to stay with Twitter unlike Facebook users who admire visuals most. But, words don’t get wings unless there is a huge fan followers on Twitter; therefore, most of the people have been opting to buy Twitter followers since very long. But, is it really worth of investment or just an act which could prove costlier in longer run?

Buy Twitter Followers: It Pays Off

Yes, and I am sticking to my words. If you are at the nascent stage of your Twitter presence you must consider falling for it. Though, one shouldn’t expect a success over night – post buying Twitter followers. An intelligent use of ‘paid acquisition’ of Twitter followers would make you reach to thousands of followers’ related to your own niche. At the later section of this post, I shall explain how this ‘art of act’ would be performed.

At this stage, its only good to see some convincing number as your Twitter followers – though they all may be as good as dead meat.

Buying Twitter Followers: A Risky Affair

Performance is an art – no matter what you do and how. And, this applies here too. While Buying Twitter followers one shouldn’t fall for the trap of grabbing thousands of followers at the price of peanuts. There are many on “Fiverr” offering few thousands Twitter followers for mere few dollars. However, the life of such following will never be long and soon after burning your pocket you will helplessly see your Twitter followers unfollowing you, in the very pace they came in.

There could be no better case study of last US Presidential election candidate “Mitt Romeny” who was accused of buying Twitter followers only to see the jump of 117,000 followers in one night – difficult to digest for anyone ! Lesson Learnt: Gradual progression is the best!

Service like InterTwitter is one of the best alternates for them who are looking for sticky followers – at least for a year. No, I am no way associated with InterTwitter or pocking any commission but, I only refer a source after testing its performance till the wall. InterTwitter provides rather active followers who could play an important role in your tweets’ success – till a certain limit, off course.

Give A Final Shot:

So, what’s the point of hanging with dead followers who came as a part of paid followers? Exactly, now it’s time when you should actually look to hit your target. Start following people who you really admire, like and stay influenced and in scores in a day. Twitter imposes a daily follow limit on every Twitter user to avoid spamming. However, for new entrants, it’s a curse. Depends upon the number of followers one has, this limit keep getting increased automatically. So, since you have already got thousands of followers (though its dead ones) you can easily ditch such barrier to follow thousands of people in a day.

And, since most of Twitter followers like to follow back their followers, chances are high you would earn a significant number of real influential people as Twitter followers. You can keep shuffling the exercise for few days and can see your tweets getting viral in no time.

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Adoption Of Android Versions: ICS Peaks At 29%, Jelly Bean Is Still Growing

By
Abhishek Singh
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0

Google has just updated the market share distribution of Android versions. As per the latest information, Android Jelly Bean–Android 4.1 and 4.2 versions–is still growing, while on the other side, it’s tough to predict whether or not Android 4.0 version will surpass even 30% marks. Meanwhile, the market share of Android’s smartphone version (Gingerbread) dropped to 45.6% as of February 4, 2013, from 47.6% a month before. Till February 4, 2013, 13.6% of Android users updated their device to Jelly Bean, while 29.0% were using Ice Cream Sandwich version.

Initially, adoption of Android 4.0 version was fueled by robust shipments of Samsung Galaxy SIII, which has now surpassed 40 million units figure in terms of sales. However, availability of Android next iteration (Jelly Bean) forced manufacturers to move with the the latest version. Just a month before, the adoption Android Ice Cream version reached to peak 29.1%.

Android Jelly Bean was introduced at Google I/O event last year, and Nexus 7 Tablet was the first device running on the OS. Later, Jelly Bean version was provided to Nexus 4 and Samsung Galaxy Note II. Of course, the strong sales of these devices boosted to the Android’s version adoption across the world. However, Android 4.2 has seen a minor 0.2 % growth to 1.4% as of February 4, from 1.2% a month before.

The sales of Google Nexus 4 smartphone is expected to surpass the 1 million mark, according to Xda-developers forum member draugaz, who has been estimating Nexus 4 sales by keeping the track record of the serial numbers of the shipped devices. More than 375,000 units of Nexus 4 were expected to be shipped by the beginning of January 2013.

android version

Of course, Nexus is one of the Google’s shining star, but the device isn’t as much popular as Galaxy and iPhone lineups are. As per the court documents, about 500,000 units of Galaxy Nexus, the predecessor of the Nexus 4, were sold between November 2011 and August 2012. In comparison, Google (in conjunction with LG) sold twice Nexus 4 units in about three months as it (with Samsung) sold Galaxy Nexus during first nine months. More importantly,  the Nexus 4 is still facing supply and availability constraints. In other words, Android 4.2 running Nexus 4 is far better than Samsung Galaxy Nexus in terms of sales.

However, it wouldn’t be rationale to compare the shipments of Nexus 4 with Galaxy S3 or the iPhone 5. Due to limited supply, Nexus 4 is still out of reach from a significant number of the device enthusiasts. Besides, limited availability is one of the the reasons that has impacted on the sales of this device; the device is still not available in number of emerging markets like India, China and Brazil.

We could easily see a sharp decline in market share of Android Gingerbread version, as significant number of Android users are switching to latest versions. As Android Jelly Bean running devices such as Galaxy S3, Galaxy Note II and Nexus 4 are still selling, we can easily predict a surge in the Android Jelly bean version’s market share in coming months.

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TV Ads Not To Be Believed: 19% Of Them Believe That Ads Are “Very Exaggerated” [Infographic]

By
Shilpa Shree
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0

Advertisements are run on almost all form of media. there are many ways to run ads–social media, television and the internet. They also show up in movie intervals as well. Despite of ads showing up everywhere,  does everybody  believe in advertisements? This is the infographic which highlights on few data like, what type of ads increase product purchases and what are consumers looking for in a ad.

According to a study by market researchers Lab42, among 500 participants surveyed, only 3% believed that the information given by advertisements was “very accurate,” while 57% believed that the ads were “somewhat exaggerated.”

This infographic shows consumers perception about ads, half of the people seem to be less than impressed by ads. Out of those surveyed, 87% thought that cleaning ads were photoshopped, while 96% thought that weight-loss ads were photoshopped.

Interestingly, 73% of respondents polled that funny ads are most memorable, and more likely to buy the product. and, 31% of them purchase a product due to brand advertizing also, sponsored posts on social media platform encouraged 3% of them to try a brand. Surprisingly, 59% of men wants an ad to “relate to me” while, 77% of men believe that beauty ads are “more accurate”. Furthermore, respondents expect brands to advertise in such a way that it makes to react (such as, share it, laugh and talk about it) and its said to be one of the top reasons why they try a new product.

Check out the infographic below for insights on ad perception, brand perception, and if brand advertisements really work.

Advertisements_perceptions

 

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Facebook Is Influencing 20% People To Ditch Desktop For Mobile [Study]

By
Shilpa Shree
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0

The importance of mobile is increasing day by day and so the traffic websites get through mobile and Tablet devices. The activities once performed by PC are shifted to these devices now.

According to a study conducted by The NPD Group, more than 20% of those polled indicated that they’re surfing the web and using Facebook less on their PCs but are engaging in such activities on their Smartphones and Tablets itself.

The shift from the PC to mobile and Tablet devices are pretty much clear in the case of Facebook as its Q4 report says, mobile ad revenue has grown to 23% of the company’s total $1.33 billion in ad revenue.

Facebook’s mobile user base is increasing and is indeed becoming dominant. Mobile ad revenue is growing quickly too, especially considering that of March 2012, where it din’t even existed. Facebook’s shares have risen 17% since the beginning of the year, that shows firm’s bet on mobile advertising is truly paying off.

As The NPD Group notes, consumers are still using their computers for many of the core PC-centric activities. 73% of PC owners still use their PCs to access internet, compared to 61% and 53% for Smartphones and Tablets, respectively. So, one cannot rule out PC market so easily, as it is still serving huge number of consumers to access internet.

Among Tablet owners, 27% say they are using their PC less frequently for accessing the Internet and 20% say they are using their PC less frequently for accessing Facebook. while, 27% of Smartphone owners have decreased both their Internet and Facebook usage on their PCs because they now use their Smartphone for these activities.

facebook Mobile users

Consumers are still using their computers for many core PC-based activities, but the tablet and Smartphone are gaining traction.  Internet browsing is still highest among PC owners at 75%, Smartphones at 61%, and Tablets at 53%.

Facebook interaction follows the same positions with PC owners at 63%, 55% for Smartphone users and 39% for Tablet users.

It’s worth noting that, 21% of consumers have an internet-connected television, and the report also highlights that many of these consumers are using those televisions to consume content from services like Netflix and Hulu.

John Buffone, director of devices, Connected Intelligence of NPD Group Says , “Despite these shifts in behavior, computers will remain the fundamental content creation device in consumer’s tool box for many years to come. Consumers, however, are switching their entertainment-centric behaviors to Tablets, Smartphones, and connected TVs at warp speed.” And, “Consumers, however, are switching their entertainment-centric behaviors to Tablets, Smartphones, and connected TVs at warp speed.  During 2013 this trend will be further perpetuated as more mobile devices become enabled with screen sharing technologies such as AllShare and Miracast that allow users to bridge their mobile devices to their TV screens.”

The recent survey observes how Twitter is grabbing TV viewers and about ‘dual screen’ behaviors were brought to light.  The study showcased that the viewers were 12x more likely to tweet regarding a TV show and 22x more likely to use the show’s official hashtag when the show was broadcasted, compared to the days it did not air.

On this note it becomes quite imperative for every company to evaluate their specific audiences and how their consumption habits are changing, such as, multi-device, multi-platform world and evaluate and increase their better user experience.

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Microsoft Biggest Bet On Surface Pro: Office And Windows Apps Would Be Arch-Weapons

By
Abhishek Singh
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0

Finally, Microsoft Surface Pro 128 GB – one of the most awaited tablets – is now available for sale in the U.S. The company started selling out the device online through ‘Microsoft Store’ from February 9 last week. The surface Pro is Microsoft’s more powerful tablet, which is being powered by Intel processor. The tablet runs the full version of Windows 8  (unlike the Surface RT), and it can also support full-fledged version of Windows desktop running applications.

Microsoft’s Intel-powered tablet was initially lashed out for the higher-price tags, despite the device has been sold out even faster than the lower-priced Surface RT tablet. The sales of Microsoft’s expensive model indicate that users are willing to get their hand on a higher value storage tablet. In addition to this, the 64 GB model is also available in stock of physical retail stores like Best Buy. However, there’s only a $100 price difference between the higher storage capacity ( 128 GB) and lower storage capacity (64 GB) versions.

Surface Pro 128-GB Could Be A Game Changer

With Surface Pro tablet, Microsoft is ready to compete with other mobile  vendors this year.  It’s true that Microsoft was the first players who brought the ‘concept of tablet’ back in 2000, but the market dismissed its efforts. Of course, people weren’t ready to embrace the concept that time. But when Apple introduced its iPad in 2010, the market was already flourished with smartphones and, people were looking out for the device with screen size bigger than smartphone, but smaller than laptops. At the time, the market is flooded with Apple’s iPads and Android tablets.

Surface Pro Tablet

Apparently, Surface Pro would be one of the biggest bet for Microsoft this year. In addition, ‘Office 365 and Office 2013’ and ‘Windows applications’ would be two arch-weapons for the company to entice mass audiences towards its tablets.

Office 360 and Office 2013

Undoubtedly, Office has always been one of the most important products for the Microsoft. With Surface Pro, the company is pushing its Office 365 subscriptions service, which costs $100 per year. More importantly, a subscription to Office 365 would let users to install its five copies on their PCs, and also they can deeply connect to the cloud for the back up of their documents. Furthermore, there’s also a version for students—Office 365 University, available at the cost of $80 for four years of use. The new version of Office 365 and 2013 are quite touch-friendly, and of course, it would be lucrative for users those are willing to use them on their tablets and touch-screen laptops. The basic versions of the Office 365 and 2013 comes pre-installed on Surface RT and Surface Pro tablets.

Windows 8 Apps:

Windows is the most preferred platform for desktop app developers. And one of the eye-catching features of the Windows 8 Pro running Surface tablet is, it supports Windows applications, unlike Surface RT. In other words, developers won’t need to put any extra effort for developing Surface pro apps. Besides, Microsoft could leverage on its smart productivity apps and imaginative ‘Xbox’ games to attract a significant number of tablet enthusiasts towards its Surface platform. Actually, the company has endeavored to bridge the gap between full-fledged PC and touchscreen tablet with its Surface Pro.

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Top 10 Android Devices In Use During January 2013: Samsung Galaxy S III Took Top Spot

By
Abhishek Singh
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1

Android is still a global leading smartphone OS platform in terms of shipments. However, the OS’ market share dropped to 69.2% in Q4 2012, despite of strong shipments of Android devices. Undoubtedly, Samsung is the biggest Android vendor, controlling almost half of the OS market share. Besides, the company is also accounting for 29% of the global smartphone market share. Just a day before, an analytics and marketing tools provider–Localytics–released a very interesting list of top 10 Android devices by users throughout January 2013.

Top 10 Android Devices In Use

Interestingly, Samsung’s Galaxy lineups dominated over all other Android devices in terms of usages during January 2013. Galaxy S 3 maintained its supremacy during the last month, accounting for 9.2% of share in terms of use. More importantly, out of top 10 Android devices, eight devices were from Samsung. Only two devices–Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Motorola’s Droid Razr–succeeded to make their presence in the list.

In terms of usages, Samsung’s other flagships including Galaxy S 2, Galaxy Ace and Galaxy Note are still performing well. Samsung Galaxy SII was at second position in usages with 8.2% share, followed by Galaxy Ace and Note with 3.0% and 2.6% respectively. Furthermore, Galaxy Note’s next iteration is quite popular among users. The stats from the marketing tool provider reveals that 2.0% of Android users used Galaxy Note 2 during January 2013.

Samsung Galaxy S III

Other Samsung’s flagship models such as Galaxy Y, Galaxy Tab 2.7.0 and Epic 4G were at the sixth, eight and tenth positions respectively in usages during January this year. It’s pretty much clear form the above chart that Amazon’s Kindle Fire is more popular than Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 2.7.0 among Android users. Kindle Fire accounted for 1.9% of Android share in use during January this year, followed by Galaxy Tab 2.7.0 with 1.4% share.

If we aggregate Samsung’s top eight devices share (listed in the above image) all together, then we will get that the company’s eight flagship models accounted for 29.6% of all Android devices shares in terms of usages during January this year.

Breaking out to some facts, Google’s Nexus 7 is still in the list of top 10 Android devices during January 2013. In addition to this,  not even a single device from Android’s second largest vendor’s (HTC’s) is in the list of top Android devices. In fact during January, 47% of Android devices in use were manufactured by Samsung. The South Korean company also accounted for 47% share (Android device in use) in December 2012, down from 48% in November last year.

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LinkedIn’s Q4 Earnings Beat Analysts’ Expectations In Shares !!

By
Shilpa Shree
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0

LinkedIn Q4 EarningsThe B2B social networking site, LinkedIn’s Q4 earnings 2012 report has been released this week.

Net income increased to 60% to $11.5 million, up $6.9 million from 2011. Excluding products, the company earned 35 cents a share, compared with 12 cents a share in 2011.

But analysts had expected earnings excluding items, 19 cents a share on $280 million in revenue and earnings per share of $0.19.

Revenue is up 81% from last year 2011. GAAP earnings per share were 10 cents. Non-GAAP net income soared from $13.3 million to $40.2 million, comparing Q4 earnings of 2011 and 2012. Adjusted EBITDA was 78.6 million, beating consensus at $62.6 million.

Before its earnings were reported, the company was worth $13.3 billion. In its most recent sequential quarter, LinkedIn bested both top and bottom line expectations, reporting revenue of $252 million and earnings per share of $0.22.

International revenue is key for LinkedIn, as roughly 66% of its userbase is not from its home market, and gains only about 33% of its total revenues from those users abroad.

By geographic area, revenue from the U.S. was $189.0 million, 62% of total revenue in the fourth quarter. while, Asia Pacific contributed $24.64 million, 8% of total share.

Coming to Revenue, Talent Solutions added up $161.0 million, up 90% from 2011, and represented 53% of total revenue compared to 51% a year ago.

Marketing Solutions added up to $83.2 million, up 68% from 2011, and represented 27% of total revenue compared to 30% a year ago.

Premium Subscriptions generated $59.4 million, up 79% from a year ago, representing 20% of total revenue and flat from a year ago.

In terms of guidance, revenue is projected at $305 million to $310 million, and adjusted EBITDA is projected at $67 million to $69 million.

In its previous Q3 2012 earnings, LinkedIn posted adjusted earnings per share of 22 cents on revenue of $252.0 million. LinkedIn was expected to post earnings of 11 cents per share on revenue of $243.9 million.

For the full calendar year of 2012, LinkedIn had $972.3 million in revenue, and non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.89.

For the full year of 2013, revenue is projected at $1.41 billion to $1.44 billion and adjusted EBITDA was expected to be $315 million to $330 million. and, for the first quarter of 2013, LinkedIn anticipates revenue of $305 million to $310 million and EBITDA of around $60 million.

LinkedIn, which recently crossed 200 million members, is one of the few recent Internet IPOs to perform strongly after its public listing. Despite, the IPO debacles of companies like Zynga, Groupon and to some extent Facebook, the stock performance is up 55% in previous year alone and every time in the past when the company report earnings, Stock jump around 4% to 5% on average following that report.

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Android Smartphone Market Share Dropped To 69.2% In Q4 2012, While iOS Saw 7% Growth

By
Abhishek Singh
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0

Last year, smartphone sales reached to a distinct level; the most important role was played by China in overall smartphone shipments among all emerging countries. According to an independent analyst firm--Canalys–Samsung topped in terms of smartphone shipments in Q4 2012. Interestingly, three Chinese vendors–Huawei, ZTE and Lenovo–succeeded to climb into the list of top five global smartphones vendors—thanks to strong shipments of their smartphones in domestic and overseas markets.

A few weeks before, an IDC’s report demonstrated only two Chinese smartphone vendors–Huawei and ZTE–in the list of top five global smartphone vendors. As per the report, Huawei took the third place in Q4 2012, shipped 10.8 million smartphones. While with 9.5 million units shipment, ZTE succeeded to grab fifth position.

But Canalys has added one more Chinese smartphone vendor (Lenovo) along with ZTE and Huawei, excluding Sony from the list of top five global smartphone vendors. More importantly, Lenovo was the fastest growing smartphone vendors during Q4 2012, recorded a whopping 216% Y/Y growth during quarter. With the shipments of 9.5 million units, Lenovo managed to hold fifth position, but it’s still struggling to make its stronghold in the overseas markets. The Chinese vendor made up 98% of its total shipments in its domestic market.

Breaking to some facts, total 438.1 million mobile handsets were shipped during the last quarter. However, overall shipments in Q4 2012 remained flat compare to the same quarter of the last year. In the  contrary, worldwide smartphone market showed off 37% Y/Y growth in Q4 2012; almost half of the all phones shipped were smartphones. Android smartphones accounted for 34% of overall mobile handset shipments in Q4 2012, while iPhones had just 11% of share.

Android Smartphone Market Share Dropped By 5%

216 million smartphones were shipped during the last qurter, out of these, 69% were running on Android mobile OS, down from 74% in the prior quarter. On the other side, Apple’s market share rose from 15% to 22%–thanks to strong sales of iPhone 5 during the last quarter.

Sales of Samsung’s smartphones grew 78% Y/Y in Q4 2012, while ZTE, Huawei and Lenovo recorded triple digit percentage growth, a more than 100%. Meanwhile, BlackBerry and Microsoft were struggling with 4% and 2% market share. However, Nokia was at the third position in terms of overall smartphone shipments considering to entire 2012. The company shipped 35 million smartphones in 2012. In comparison, Apple sold 101 million more smartphones than Nokia during 2012, while  Samsung sold 74 million more smartphones what Apple sold during entire last year.

Android smartphone market share

The most eye-catching point of the Canalys report is smartphone shipments in China; 73% of mobile handsets shipped last year in the world’s largest phone market were smartphones, up from 40% in the last year. In terms of smartphone volume, the market showed off 113% growth to 64.7 million units in 2012. Last year, Samsung was top smartphone vendor in the country, followed by Lenovo and Yulong.

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Huawei Is Imitating Samsung’s Moves: Ascend P2 Might Have Octa-Core Processor [Images Leaked]

By
Abhishek Singh
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0

Huawei doesn’t remain just a telecommunication equipment maker; the company has now become the world’s third biggest smartphone vendor in terms of shipment. The Chinese telecom vendor shipped 10.8 million smartphones in Q4 2012, up from 5.7 million in the same quarter of the previous year. In other words, the company recorded 89% Y/Y growth in the last quarter.

Huawei’s all flagship smartphones are currently based on Android platform, and it’s true that Samsung is the biggest player on this platform. Over the last couple of years, Huawei has succeeded to devour the market share of other Android vendors, including HTC, LG and Motorola. However, Samsung has diversified strategies with its smartphone business; It’s currently working on number of mobile OS platforms such as Tizen,  Windows Phone, Bada and more.

Likewise, Huawei has also teamed up with Microsoft, and it has recently launched a Windows Phone-powered smartphone exclusively for African markets. However, the price of the device hasn’t been disclosed by anyone from these two companies, but the price is considered to be very affordable. The aim of Huawei here is to sell out tens million of smartphones over next couple of years by offering these devices at very affordable price tags.

In the continent, it’s trying to increase the smartphone penetration. For this, it’s aggressively panning to improve the apps’ number, those could be appealing enough to local consumers. It wants to encourage more number of users to switch from the feature phones to low-priced smartphones. More importantly, Africa is considered as the Huawei’s fastest growing market outside of China. In simple words, like Samsung, the Chinese smartphone vendor is likely to build both low-end and high-end mobile handsets.

Huawei Is Imitating Samsung’s Strategy

With high-end smartphone, Huawei is endeavoring to compete with other manufacturers in the matured markets, meanwhile it also wants to manufacture low-end mobile handsets for emerging markets. Samsung is the first company who brought the concept of Phablet, a hybridized smartphone, in the market. And now, Galaxy Note II has created new history in terms of shipments.

This time, Huawei is also working on its Phablet project, a 6.1-inch Phablet Ascend Mate. The company unveiled its two major products–Ascend D2 and Ascend Mate–at CES event last month. Now, there’s also a  rumor about Ascend P2 over the past few weeks.

It’s  said that Samsung might launch Galaxy S IV smartphone by the end of April this year. The devices is expected to have Octa-core processor. However, we have already argued whether or not there’s need of Octa-core processor, because dual-core and quad-core processors are quite sufficient to fulfill users’ requirement.

Interestingly, rumors say that the Huawei Ascend P2 smartphone might have Octa-core processor. At present, lots of unofficial photos of Ascend P2 are available in the market. Look at the recently leaked Ascend P2 images:

Ascend-P2

Huawei-Ascend-P2

These pictures couldn’t be considered as authentic. However, the device is expected to feature 8-core system-on-chip, a 4.7-inch full HD screen, 2 GB RAM, 13 MP rear-facing camera, Android Jelly Bean and a 3,000 mAh. In addition, Huawei Ascend P2 is expected to be launched at the price tag of just $480.

Anyway, we can’t deny Huawei’s recent moves. However, the company recently slammed the South Korean mobile handset maker for the lack of innovation. Just for the moment, think about some points: Why Huawei has decided to launch 6.1-inch Phablet? Why it has teamed up with Microsoft in Africa? Why is it planning to launch Octa-core processor running smartphone? The reason is quite simple that it wants to kill Samsung in smartphone battlefield.

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