Virtual Office: In the busy corporate world, business executives need to be connected 24 hours in order to achieve more efficient performance and in turn organisational effectiveness. Most businesses strategise to achieve greater revenues and hence employees are looking to work continuously around the clock (Rash 2010). Hence quick flow of information is the primary element for which smartphones are highly favourable devices. Most modern day smartphones such as blackberry and Apple iphone have instant messaging system that allow business executives to stay connected creating a virtual office network especially when they are not at office or on a vacation. On a whole, information exchange within businesses, have become instant and much accurate. 4
Common Interface for Computing & Entertainment: Most consumers are looking to integrate mobile computing and mobile entertainment into their ongoing personal and professional lives (Grey et.al 2010). This has motivated Apple to develop the Apple Mall software. Apple Mall will be equipped in the new series Apple iphones that will enable users to create, and manage multiple application stores wherein vendors sell their digital application, media and services. Most entertainment packages are spreading very fast through Apple Mall since it provides mechanism for unified billing, advertising facility, medium to accept feedbacks and other e-commerce functionalities (Grey et.al 2010). Thus we see that Smartphones are slowly coordinating utilities of both a computer and a music player into a single compact handheld device. 5
Social Networking: The increased penetration of social networking sites is helping smartphones to popularise more and more. The inbuilt functionalities of different social networking sites in modern day smartphones have caused more and more of the common mass to purchase them. The increase in the usage of facebook in the last two years is more through smartphones than through computers (Sun & Poole 2010). People are using more and more Smartphones to popularise social networking and hence are cutting down on bills incurred through calls and messaging. 5
Customised Event Based Services: During the 2004 Athens Olympics, Samsung launched a new Wireless Olympic Works package called Samsung WOW, which enabled tournament officials, staffs and VIP's to have access to an information portal featuring events schedule, real time scoring, results and medal tallies (Dudley 2004). Nokia is in talks with FIFA officials to launch identical applications using real time behaviour for the 2014 world cup (Underwood 2010). 5
Beyond Communication: In the recent past Smartphones are being used more as a medium of creating viral marketing. The widget applications incorporated within Smartphones are attracting more and more companies associated with ecommerce to create viral marketing campaigns. For example Bloomberg has attracted more iphone users to the stock markets through its "live stock" widget facility. Similarly Buddyfinder and Wireless Digital City are other applications that use GPS technology to locate addresses through post-codes (Sun & Poole 2010). 6
Opportunities and Threats for Smartphones: 6
1.4 Conclusion: 7
2.1 Introduction to ecommerce and web2.0 technology: 9
2.1.1 Role of ecommerce and web2.0 in the popularity of e-Bay and Amazon. 10
References 13
Abstract:
Wireless telecommunication have transformed drastically, worldwide, over the last three decade. From cordless telephones to cellular phones we have seen a major revolution in the field of innovation and technology. In this report we broadly focus upon how mobile phones have transformed in to smartphones in the modern in the modern era, and also what will the potential future of smartphones in the years to come. We touch upon evidences to see the way in which smartphones are transforming into an integral element of human life.
In the latter half of the report we focus on the element of e-commerce. Slowly but surely consumers all across the world are becoming more and more tech-savvy. Hence retailers are looking to sell more and more through the internet. The development of e-commerce has been made possible through the emergence of WEB 2.0 technology. The report thus focuses upon the possible ways in which web 2.0 has played a pivotal role in the success of major online retailers such as Amazon and e-Bay.
Development of Smartphones:
The concept of smartphone was first developed by IBM through its flagship product Simon in 1992 at a technology trade show; COMDEX in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Schneidawind 1992). A year later the product came out in the market, and instantly it was a successful concept. Besides being a simple mobile phone, it had augmented features such as ability to store memos, send emails and receive fax. It also had a touch screen system with a virtual notepad on which characters could be hand written with a stylus.
Simon was a product that was well appreciated and adapted by the business class executives. This prompted mobile giants Nokia to launch the communicator series in collaboration with Hewlett Packard in 1996. The communicator was the first PDA (personal digital assistant) that had incorporated features such as megapixel camera, WiFi, and GPRS tracking system. After the popularity of the Nokia Communicator series the next major moves was made by Ericsson in 2000 when they launched the R380 model using the Symbian OS. This was the first PC phone that became an instant market leader till in 2002, when it was toppled over by Microsoft through its first pocket PC the Windows CE that was a smartphone having the Windows XP software.
In the same year, RIM came out with its flagship product the Blackberry which has achieved a total customer base of 35 million by 2010.
2007 is said to have been the revolutionary year for the development of smart phones that saw intense competition starting to develop in the global market with the entry of Apple iPhone, HTC Touch and Nokia N95. The first generation iPhone lacked a 3G facility. A year later the cross platform OS, Android was released, which facilitated Apple to launch the second generation iPhone with a 3G facility. The advent of Android has been backed by major hardware and software giants like Google, Intel, HTC, Motorola, Samsung and many others, to form the Open Handset Alliance. The first handset launched under this alliance was the HTC Dream which used the Android OS. (http://www.openhandsetalliance.com/oha_members.html)
Implications of Smartphone uses:
Virtual Office: In the busy corporate world, business executives need to be connected 24 hours in order to achieve more efficient performance and in turn organisational effectiveness. Most businesses strategise to achieve greater revenues and hence employees are looking to work continuously around the clock (Rash 2010). Hence quick flow of information is the primary element for which smartphones are highly favourable devices. Most modern day smartphones such as blackberry and Apple iphone have instant messaging system that allow business executives to stay connected creating a virtual office network especially when they are not at office or on a vacation. On a whole, information exchange within businesses, have become instant and much accurate.
Common Interface for Computing & Entertainment: Most consumers are looking to integrate mobile computing and mobile entertainment into their ongoing personal and professional lives (Grey et.al 2010). This has motivated Apple to develop the Apple Mall software. Apple Mall will be equipped in the new series Apple iphones that will enable users to create, and manage multiple application stores wherein vendors sell their digital application, media and services. Most entertainment packages are spreading very fast through Apple Mall since it provides mechanism for unified billing, advertising facility, medium to accept feedbacks and other e-commerce functionalities (Grey et.al 2010). Thus we see that Smartphones are slowly coordinating utilities of both a computer and a music player into a single compact handheld device.
Social Networking: The increased penetration of social networking sites is helping smartphones to popularise more and more. The inbuilt functionalities of different social networking sites in modern day smartphones have caused more and more of the common mass to purchase them. The increase in the usage of facebook in the last two years is more through smartphones than through computers (Sun & Poole 2010). People are using more and more Smartphones to popularise social networking and hence are cutting down on bills incurred through calls and messaging.
Customised Event Based Services: During the 2004 Athens Olympics, Samsung launched a new Wireless Olympic Works package called Samsung WOW, which enabled tournament officials, staffs and VIP's to have access to an information portal featuring events schedule, real time scoring, results and medal tallies (Dudley 2004). Nokia is in talks with FIFA officials to launch identical applications using real time behaviour for the 2014 world cup (Underwood 2010).
Beyond Communication: In the recent past Smartphones are being used more as a medium of creating viral marketing. The widget applications incorporated within Smartphones are attracting more and more companies associated with ecommerce to create viral marketing campaigns. For example Bloomberg has attracted more iphone users to the stock markets through its "live stock" widget facility. Similarly Buddyfinder and Wireless Digital City are other applications that use GPS technology to locate addresses through post-codes (Sun & Poole 2010).
Opportunities and Threats for Smartphones:
Opportunities:
The never- seen- before rising trend of mobile banking is a major opportunity as with busier schedules and more monetary security needs, mobile banking is widely accepted.
Also, interestingly, rising teen purchasing power, their tastes and preferences are shifting due to various reasons (peer pressure). Smartphones being a rage in the youth is the biggest opportunity that can be grabbed by a mobile phone organization. Need of information access anywhere in convenient mode is also a good prospect to attract the potential consumer base on this attribute of a Smartphone. It is easy to comprehend the fact here that it is the need of the hour to stay trendy yet smart; Smartphones completely fit the bill (Goodman & Harris 2010).
The emerging economies such as the BRIC nations hold the maximum potential for Smartphone markets. In India for example, local producers such as LAVA and Micromax have already started to produce and distribute low priced Smartphones. With increasing levels of disposable income and brand awareness it is evident that companies like RIM and Blackberry are looking more and more towards these markets for future investments.
1.3.2 Threats:
Any innovative technology, however appealing it is, becomes obsolete over a period of time. Though everyday new applications like Android from Google, are imbibed in the Smartphone, it is imperative that entry of any better technology in the form of in the market can occur, which is the biggest threat to a Smartphone.
Security vulnerability is another threat to the adoption of the product by late adopters and the consumer segment further, due o the risk- averse nature of these segments, which refrains them from such risk taking purchase.
Market structure in a particular geography can be distinguishingly a halt to the rapid rise in Smartphones purchase. It is significant to note here that even the market structure or high user costs can bring an end to the trend. Smartphones can be perceived to be high end purchase by the majority of the market due to their current positioning in the manner. So, a competitor can modify the product or its promotions restricting the Smartphone to a certain consumer base (Goodman & Harris 2010).
1.4 Conclusion:
Let us consider certain facts and figures supporting the development of Smartphones. According to latest report released by IDC, more than 1.6 billion devices were used to track the internet that included PC's, Smartphones and online gaming consoles. More than 450 million mobile internet users are predicted across the world in 2009 and the number is sure to surpass 1 billion by 2013. Mobile Web users will be doing a lot more searching from their mobile phones, thanks to applications that are improving monthly in their efficiency. In a small but salient example, Google refreshed its Google Mobile Apps for the iPhone to open Web pages from the search results, rather than making users jump to a separate Safari browser window (Boulton 2010). The music industry is showing a paradigm shift towards the online medium. After the acquisition of iLike and iMeem by My Space, Apple has launched Lala. IDC also opines that businesses are investing in empowering their executives with Smartphones such as Blackberry. IBM has developed several interfaces using Lotus while Google has incorporated the Google Apps Connector for Blackberry Enterprise Server (Boulton 2010). Most businesses are trying to sell through the internet using mobile applications shifting the trend of e-commerce towards m-commerce. Twitter launched the mobile payment system Square that enables users to make purchases over the iPhone.
Considering these facts and figures we can arrive at a vivid conclusion that Smartphones are surely emerging out as the single most important device in human life.
2.1 Introduction to ecommerce and web2.0 technology:
Ecommerce is defined as digitally enabled commercial transaction amongst individuals and organisations. The practice of ecommerce has revolutionised in the mid 1990's and now many companies look at ecommerce as a prospective business model to enter the market with. Ecommerce has helped in the evolution both B2B and B2C businesses effectively. Ecommerce facilitates companies to reach a wider customer base than other companies that operate through traditional store format because of the easy access of internet. Companies like Amazon and e-bay have popularised dramatically around the world due to the wide use of internet. Ecommerce also helps companies to cut down drastically on operating expenses incurred in retail operations.
The development of ecommerce has also caused a considerable change in capital markets. With more and more companies enabling online share trading, the stock exchanges find more investors around the world. The development of ecommerce has also helped companies to reduce advertising cost and increase advertising revenue.
A leveraging tool that has effectively helped ecommerce to revolutionise globally is web2.0. Web 2.0 technology involves web applications that help in creating user centred designs, interoperability, interactive information sharing and in turn development of the World Wide Web. A complete gamut of online tools that include podcasting, blogs, RSS, social bookmarking and social networking are continuously creating platforms that help people to share their opinions and thoughts.
2.1.1 Role of ecommerce and web2.0 in the popularity of e-Bay and Amazon.
With the rapid development of ecommerce retailers saw a cost effective way to sell products is through the internet. This called in for the introduction of a business model whose value chain activities were identical to those of traditional retailing but it minimised the cost of setting up stores and store operations. (Nath et.al 2010)
(Transaction Processing System in e-tailing; Nath et.al 2010)
Illustrated above is the transaction process in online retailing which was introduced due to the advancement of ecommerce. Thus Amazon and eBay were successively launched in 1995 as online retailers of a wide variety of products. Amazon which started in 1995 as a seller of books online gradually developed to sell a wide variety of products in various categories whilst eBay started in 1995 was a pioneer of creating online auction and selling of different products. In the case of Amazon users could give feedback regarding their products even before web2.0 technology came into existence. Although the concept of ecommerce was the triggering point for the establishment of online retailing websites, the success of these websites was restored to the development of web2.0 technology. Let us consider the factors behind their successes discretely.
Amazon:
Reviews: The website allows its users to submit reviews and rate its products on a rating scale of one to five. The importance and validity of a regular user is also analysed through the screening of his or her credit card account. If the reviewer is found to be a regular user then his or her opinion is regarded as very important for development of new products and services (Spector).
"Search inside the book": This is an application that has been developed to facilitate users to search key words within books in the catalogue. Although this facility has the danger of information leaks, amazon.com has created a new system. To avoid copyright violations, amazon.com does not return the computer-readable text of the book. Instead, it returns a picture of the matching page, disables printing, and puts limits on the number of pages in a book a single user can access. Additionally, customers can purchase online access to some of the same books via the "Amazon Upgrade" program, which again has been incorporated due to the web2.0 technology.
"Amazon Associates": This is another interface present on Amazon that enables third party sellers to sell products on amazon.com. The company has registered 40 percent of its operating profits from third party sellers helping the company to gain fourth position overall in third party sales (auctionbytes.com 2010). The company has registered over 1 million third party sellers in its affiliate programme. The XML Amazon Web Service helps associates to access the Amazon catalogue on their websites. aStore is a another of its kind of interface that allows associates to incorporate parts of parts of Amazon products within or link to other websites. In June 2010, Amazon Seller Product Suggestions, another web2.0 enabled programme was launched to provide more transparency to sellers. The programme recommended third party users to sell specific products based on customer browsing history.
eBay:
Auction: Online auction was something started by eBay and later on Amazon also incorporated it into its services. This is a web2.0 enabled interface on websites that enabled users to bid for a particular product at the lowest possible price. The auction feature helped both eBay in particular to increase its customer base by many folds (ebay.com). eBay offers several types of auctions namely auction style listing, fixed price format and fixed price format with best offers.
Selling Manager Application: In 2008, eBay developed the Selling Managers Application program. The SM Apps allows certain company approved developers to incorporate their applications directly into the website interface. Thus the applications created by developers are available to those eBay members who are subscribers of the Selling Manager Application package (ebay.com).
(2505 words)
