The Six Immutable Laws of Mobile Business - PUBLISHED

At long, long last my first book, The Six Immutable Laws of Mobile Business has been published by John Wiley & Sons. The new website for the book is also up and running, and Marco, Ludovico and I have started making presentations in Japan and around the world about the six most important laws for the development and launch of mobile/wireless solutions. I am of course biased, but believe that the best practices from within the Japanese mobile market over the last 10+ years have extremely valuable and important lessons and insights for mobile executives globally.

I am looking forward to your comments and feedback!

New Hopes for Japanese Handset Manufacturers

David McNeill has written a very interesting story in The Independent today on Japanese handset manufacturers and their efforts to grow internationally once again. A number of people have been very interested Google Android and its influence on Japanese handset manufacturers. I've also argued in this recent Forbes article that while Apple and iPhone are making an enormous impact globally, for all other players outside of the Apple's value system, that Google Android offers something not yet seen before.

I'd love your comments and opinions on what I've been saying so far, and look forward to watching how the industry develops over the next 6-12 months.

Cellphone Radiation re-revisited

The debate will go on well into the future, but finally some information that can aid consumers in making a choice regarding the level of radiation they are willing to "consume" when using their mobile phone.

The Environmental Working Group ha just released a report that outlines the radiation emission levels of more than 1,000 phones. While the survey is not completely comprehensive (maybe the Mobile Consumer Lab needs to conduct these studies for Japanese handsets? -- any comments or suggestions?), but the results and report are very interesting.

The full story in Wired can be found here .

How long before handset manufacturers begin promoting the low radiation emission levels of their devices? Samsung Impression -- Only 0.35 W/kg of radiation. Compared to the iPhone you can talk more than 3 times longer and still have a lower radiation exposure level.

Maybe texting and the MobileNet are the answer... only time will tell.

Burglars Using Social Media

This recent story on burglars using Social Media such as Facebook and Twitter appears to not be just an Australia-specific event.

While we continue to focus on the many positive aspects that Internet and Mobile social media bring to consumers globally, it's very important to remember that the information flow that we create when using these often is uncontrolled, and may seep out into places that we didn't initially intend.

This is an enormous challenge for the burgeoning mobile industry, but one where I see an incredible opportunity for innovation.

Who will figure out how to further empower the consumer, and our control over our own data? The ones who do are sure to have a competitive edge in the marketplace.

We'll be looking into this and other elements of consumer empowerment using mobile/wireless technologies this year in the Mobile Consumer Lab!

Mobile Health Part II

This week, UK-based Applied Nanodetectors brought a prototype of their breath-analyzing technology to an industry event here in Japan. This type of innovation adds further support to the fact that these types of services will become increasingly important in both developed and developing economies around the world. Remote medicine may no longer need to be so remote... Here is the full story from the Small Times

4 Billion Mobile Subscribers

Whew! A little later than the expected Q4 2008 ITU expectations for this milestone, but today the GSMA announced that the world has truly surpassed the 4 billion mark. That's just shy of 59% of the world's 6.8 billion people. And factoring out those too young or too old to text and make phone calls, we are reaching an astounding level of connectivity.

For all those out there who are predicting that the mobile phone is ushering in a whole new way of business and living our lives, with a diffusion level of these proportions, it's getting nearly impossible to argue that these can and will ever stay the same.

And if we add in Marshall McLuhan's feelings that just the association with a new media (as opposed to active adoption and usage), leads to fundamental changes in our behaviors, the 1st degree non-subscribing connections of these 4 billion mobile phone users are also being influenced.

The takeaway? It's an exciting time to be studying and exploring the impact of mobile technologies and services on consumer behavior!

Mobile Health Applications for Developing Economies

Today, it was announced that Dimagi was focusing its efforts on providing health-related information services available to health workers in Tanzania.

The full report is on the Industry Standard site here .

While this is a fantastic next step, our friends over at Mobile Healthcare have already taken this idea one step farther and placing patient care in the hands of actual patients as well.

Putting these two ideas together could possible lead to unprecedented advances in health care solutions for both developed and developing economies. Providing health care workers with remote applications and tools, and patients with self-diagnostic capabilities could take the mobile platform to an entirely new level of usefulness.

I remember reading that a Japanese company had applied for patents related to patient self-diagnostic tools (for monitoring temperature, heartbeats, etc..). If anyone can find this company for me, it might help solidify this idea..

It's clear though that 2009 will be a very exciting year for mobile/wireless solutions!