Mobile Business Services

Mobile business services are attracting increasing attention and they promise a multibillion dollar market whose characteristics are quite distinct compared to mobile consumer services. Competitive activity among players keen on tapping into this opportunity is increasing rapidly. In this article, we look at mobile business services from a strategic business perspective. We chart the mobile business services landscape and discuss the underlying market drivers and potential end-user benefits. Additionally, we describe the competitive landscape and discuss the relative positions of the primary player groups.

The Impact of Technology Advances on Strategy Formulation in Mobile Communications Networks

Over the last couple of years, we have been witnessing the process of convergence between wireless and wired networks, under intense technological innovation and rapid market evolution. Mobile operators are trying to maintain a leading role in the market as it evolves towards integration with the Internet. However, the development of a multitude of new services will require the growth of a whole new market for network connectivity, applications and content. In order to understand the business opportunities arising and the ensuing competitive dynamics, this chapter explores the evolution of key players’ business relationships and strategies along with a range of critical issues that will be faced by companies and regulators alike.

Towards a Classification Framework for Mobile Location Based Services

The emerging world of mobile commerce is characterized by a multiplicity of exciting new technologies, applications, and services. Among the most promising ones will be the ability to identify the exact geographical location of a mobile user at any time. This ability opens the door to a new world of innovative services, which are commonly referred to as Mobile Location Services (MLS). This chapter aims at exploring the fascinating world of MLS, identifying the most pertinent issues that will determine its future potential, and laying down the foundation of a new field of research and practice. The contribution of our analysis is encapsulated into a novel classification of mobile location services that can serve both as an analytical toolkit and an actionable framework that systemizes our understanding of MLS applications, underlying technologies, business models, and pricing schemes.

Wireless Device for Mobile Commerce

Well-designed and usable interfaces for mobile commerce applications are critical. But given the uniqueness of the wireless environment, usability becomes even harder to ensure. This chapter describes the benefits and limitations of various wireless device interface technologies. It provides guidance on determining the usability of wireless devices, emphasizing the fact that context will factor heavily into the use of mobile applications. Some of the additional challenges that developers face when designing applications for wireless devices, such as infrastructure and software issues, are also discussed.

M-Commerce in the Automotive Industry

The telematics technology, intended to streamline the information processing requirements of consumers driving a vehicle, has brought to surface the need for integrating the information technology architectures of various service providers with the manufacturing technologies of various automotive firms. While system integration has always been an issue when multiple vendors are involved in providing enterprise-wide solutions in business, this issue takes on greater prominence when it can impact the privacy and security of the driving public as a whole. This article briefly looks at various opportunities telematics can provide to satisfy the “mobile” society, and discusses the organizational behavior required to operationalize the technological capability and inter-company behavior to enable flexible business models. It will also discuss the role multiple business and government leaders have to play to ensure that these opportunities do not come at a significant social cost.

A Perspective on M-Commerce

Several statistics from several industry sources have forecast staggering growth for m-commerce over the next five years. But assuming we believe the statistics, marketers need to understand the dynamics of mobile usage and position themselves to take advantage of this substantial opportunity. While most marketers understand that wireless consumers have different application needs and usage patterns than standard online users, many may be perplexed in finding a logical starting point for developing a marketing approach to m-commerce. This chapter outlines some of the key differences in online consumer behavior and provides a perspective on how marketers might use mobile commerce to stimulate consideration and purchase of their products and services. The chapter shares an approach and an existing application used by The Coca-Cola Company to provide a reference point and to help other marketers understand and leverage mobile commerce as another viable tool in their marketing arsenal.

Case Study

Building a brand in the fragmenting media environment is a challenging task. Advertising should be integrated and personalized, it should utilize different channels, and reach the customer at the right place, at the right time, through the right channel, and in the appropriate context. Mobile advertising should be used as a means of creating value to the customers and serving the customers better. This paper gives an insight into the practical possibilities and pitfalls of mobile advertising as a brand building and customer relationship management tool. The case study describes how mobile advertising can be used to get the youth target group to give information about themselves to the company, and how this information can be utilized for future customer relationship management. The effectiveness of mobile advertising in a cross media context is analyzed through conversion and loyalty measures.

Wireless Personal and Local Area Networks

Wireless communication is a technical and business revolution. Mobile phones are a common site in most cities around the world. Wireless personal and local area networks provide digital connectivity among mobile computing devices, including desktop, laptops and personal digital assistants (PDA). This chapter focuses on the competing standards that are vying for dominance in the booming wireless market. To prepare the reader, a broad review of wireless technology is provided. The various organizations that support the competition standards are outlined. The chapter concludes with some predictions, anticipating the outcomes of a very volatile marketplace.

Location Based Services

Location based services (LBS) are considered by some to be the ‘golden child” of wireless data services and one of the few areas where users would be willing to pay a premium for usage. Mobile Operators however are yet to be convinced, and despite acknowledging location services as strategic, have not considered it a priority. Recent LBS deployments however focusing on a holistic view of user behaviour are showing positive signs of success. These deployments focus on providing services that integrate different content from multiple sources to provide users with a coherent and logically connected flow of application options. These applications are called “Find it, Route it, Share it & Buy it. Importantly this model maximises return on investment (ROI) by motivating user to undertake multiple transactions. The challenge for those within the LBS industry is to convince mobile operators that LBS is viable and can deliver a strong ROI. Indeed, the future success of LBS is as much dependant on locating the money as it is about locating the subscribers.

The Wireless Application Protocol

Individually, the Internet and mobile telephony have witnessed extraordinary growth during the last decade. However, only recently have these two areas of technological development begun to converge. The result is the availability of wireless data communications on remote devices, enabling an array of applications tailored for consumer mobility. In this new era, one standard has been hailed as the entry platform for creating mobile Internet services – the Wireless Application Protocol (WAP). Whether WAP will become a key platform is unclear, but it has provided an interesting starting point for the emergence of mobile data services. This paper explores the dynamics of the emerging market for WAP services, examining the role of the consumer, suppliers, substitutes, new entrants and rivalry among the players. The paper concludes by examining some of the key strategies for WAP service provision, making some predictions regarding the future of strategic Internet service delivery.