3, Android and SIME: Mobile Business Round Table, Stockholm – Post Event Summary

3 and SIME organized a mobile business round table on Thursday, October 7, 2009 at O-Baren, Stockholm that went by the tag line, “because your mobile is more important than your pinky” , which many people really voted to be. On a loose survey conducted at SIME last year, many people felt that they would lose their pinky in lieu of their mobile phone, startling but true.

Read event information here

It was a gathering of like minded people from the Swedish mobile circle talking about how the mobile industry has undergone changes, and probably why now is the best time to get into the sector. From the pioneering Scandinavian region, to the developing markets of India and Africa, mobile seems to the common uniting point for people. No one is ever found without a mobile in the hand, and if at all that is a yardstick to go by, what should marketers, developers, telco’s and OEM’s do to embrace the revolution. The main topics of focus was:

- Geeks vs the Markets

- Mobile Marketing, the hype to reality. How steep is the graph really

- The Asian tilt of the market

- And the walled garden of the telco’s.

The event got into motion with the following video (in Swedish only, thanks the viral company)

Geeks vs the Markets

Geeks or developers have always been at the forefront of making solutions they like or their small clique of people have liked. Of course, they have led to fantastic mobile developments, and now we are precariously placed in a position where its again the geeks that are making sure innovative concepts are alive in the mobile-sphere, but most importantly most of their solutions are market ready, for marketization , commercialization and for wide spread mobile adoption, spurred through the Internet and new social media tools. In short, the barrier to entry has never been so low for such products to be part of a larger offering. Something that goes along with bundled packaging by telco’s or OEM’s.

Mobile Marketing – making the hype into reality

In general mobile marketing has been a buzz word since the start of the decade, but never really has anyone gone against the fortune cookie that always reads “better luck in 10 years”. The standards are still missing, and the big media houses are still trying to make sense as whether its worth the money and time, something they did with the Internet not too long ago. Probably, it does require some shaking up the telco phenomenon who seem to be holding their users (and hence the money) so close to heart.

The Asian Flavors

The room was in complete agreement that the Asian flavors are too good to miss. Booming Chinese and Indian markets, more than 30M mobile lines added month on month, and everyone seems to be placing their bets everywhere. So the Asian tilt is a defining trend that will shape the future of the industry in a big way for a long time to come.

And the walled garden of the telco’s

Finally, the telco’s who have always had a closed sealed fenced walled garden seem to be atleast opening up slightly. Apple seems to have again got people by the neck, controlling a portion of the money from the users through their iTunes platform. And slowly, operators are realizing it like the labels in the music industry, more they try to control, more they lose their grip. And recent partnership announcement of Telia and Spotify to offer exclusive Spotify phones, for instance, show that the telco seems to be loosening up albeit a little. Again, the barrier to entry due to this trend is lower than ever before, and with operators like 3 that have been at the forefront of the convergence between social media and telephony seem to be playing the ball the way everyone would like to see them do.

A big thanks!

Finally, a big thanks to all those who made it and shared their views. And to those lovely twitter users who did their part to get the world to follow them.  #SIME worked well in the twitter-verse

Deadly Joakim, the man behind the SIME Web and a whole host of SIME things, made this lovely animoto video with photos from the event. Thanks J, the SIME experience would not be the same without you. SIME is also working with 3 on the Android Developer Contest. Check out information on that here

SIME Android Event from SIME on Vimeo.