Strategic Inflection Points
Huawei may sell its 5G technology to a Western buyer – Piece offering
A Stunning Development in the Global Smartphone Industry Source: Huawei may sell its 5G technology…
La French Tech
Too Many Web Apps, Too Little Money
Web app development is yet another case of the 1% versus the 99%. Only one…
e-commerce
Is Facebook Simply Replicating Kenya's Successful M-Pesa Mobile Payment System?
Since Facebook announced its new Libra currency and mobile payments scheme, the global reaction has been very mixed. Libra is not truly a cryptocurrency though it will use blockchain. It will be pegged to a reserve currency, which cryptocurrencies are not. Libra will “potentially” be governed by an association independent of Facebook, though that association remains non-binding and sketchy at this point. Potential regulatory issues abound around the World, and Facebook is currently not viewed very favorably by many governments. But most interesting to me, Libra appears to be modeled after Kenya’s M-Pesa mobile payments system, the world’s leading mobile payments system, invented by mobile carrier Safaricom. Then I asked myself if Facebook, knowing that it needs to move away from selling personal data, has seized on Safaricom’s M-Pesa as its new revenue model.
social media
Mayo615 Has A New Look
Welcome To Mayo615’s New Look I decided it was time to update the website with…
Virtual Reality
Integration of AI, IoT and Big Data: The Intelligent Assistant
Five years ago, I wrote a post on this blog disparaging the state of the Internet of Things/home automation market as a “Tower of Proprietary Babble.” Vendors of many different home and industrial product offerings were literally speaking different languages, making their products inoperable with other complementary products from other vendors. The market was being constrained by its immaturity and a failure to grasp the importance of open standards. A 2017 Verizon report concluded that “an absence of industry-wide standards…represented greater than 50% of executives concerns about IoT. Today I can report that finally, the solutions and technologies are beginning to come together, albeit still slowly.
China
Updating My Smartphone Market Analysis: The Market Is At A Strategic Inflection Point
NOTE: My original post, originally published in January 2013, continues to be one of the most viewed on the site. Android and Apple have enjoyed an estimated 98% market share between the two, and many of my earlier projections regarding this market appear to have been borne out. However, the smartphone market has now matured to the point that it is at a strategic inflection point which has major implications for the future of this market and the major competitors. The rapid maturation of the smartphone market should have been foreseen: the rise of domestic Chinese competition combined with the predictable end of the Western consumer fascination with “the next smartphone”
Near field communication
Big Data, Cloud, Smart Mobile And Even AR Morph Into One Mind Boggling Thing
IEEE Talk: Integrated Big Data, The Cloud, & Smart Mobile: Actually One Big Thing by David…
Smart meter
The Internet of Things: The Promise Versus the Tower of Hacked Babbling Things
The term “Internet of Things” (IoT) is being loosely tossed around in the media. But…
Silicon Valley Culture
WCW III: World Chip War III
After something of a long hiatus, we have an emerging epic World Chip War Three, which is being fought over “CODECS,” and related chips which power our smartphones. Not that the semiconductor industry hasn’t been innovating and evolving, but this is something much bigger. Today’s news about Broadcom’s bid for Qualcomm omits the other crucial player in this new War of Titans, Intel, which has risen from earlier ignominious failures to become the third player in WCW III.
Industry Analysis
Rogers Ranks Lowest In Canada Wireless Customer Care
Many observers and former employees say it is run like an offshore sweatshop, complete with stressful bullying No quality customer service can come from such a dysfunctional work environment. The gig economy philosophy is apparent with employee’s reduced to total submission to draconian work rules, total surveillance of all voice and written communication, and apparent high turnover. Burnout is common. Three years ago, there was something of a Sykes employee revolt, when a number of supervisory employees were fired, and an anonymous broadcast email was posted describing the poor management practices. Outsourcing like this has been a common means to cut costs in the wireless industry.
