Fun Facts in Support of Mobile Internet

The author William Gibson said something like "The future is already here, it is just unevenly distributed." I believe that is true for the mobile internet; the innovators are already living the mobile internet life, in some cases because they are early adopters and in others because the mobile culture is strong in their country.

Here are a few fun facts that support the move to mobile internet, and in some cases surprised even me:

• One half the world's populations has mobile phones. I knew the penetration was high (80% +/-) in developed nations, but would have guessed the developing world would pull this average further down. Note that for many of these people, the mobile phone is their only access to the internet.


• One eighth of Americans uses a mobile phone in place of a landline phone. Twenty five percent who have moved recently have opted to use their wireless instead of a landline phone. This increases the time period where the mobile phone is close at hand, and thus available for other mobile services.


• Despite all the discussion about the U.S. technophobes, 32 percent of U.S. mobile phone users accessed the internet in a recent month, and 41 percent sent pictures on a mobile phone. In Japan, almost as many used a mobile device to access the internet in a recent month, as used a work or home computer. These stats make for a great number of impressions available for advertisers.


• Speaking of advertising, a recent IBM study forecasts that global mobile advertising will grow at 41% p.a. from 2006-2010, versus a growth of 5.9% p.a. for all advertising. It is about time to get out ahead of this bandwagon.


• We will see roughly $22B in mobile payments by 2011, across 204 M mobile users.  Which companies will get grab a share of that market?  Today's financial leaders or today's innovators?

Who says the mobile internet is a myth?  At this point the gap is a failure of imagination.