Mobile Commerce Meet Moore's Law

Mobile data usage is closely following the path that early Internet adoption took.

Then (Internet): The first killer application of the Internet - email.
Now (Mobile): The first truly robust and addictive mobile application - Blackberry.

Then (Internet): Chat Rooms/Bulletin Boards.
Now (Mobile): Texting.

Then (Internet): Yahoo! for News and Sports.
Now (Mobile): Yahoo! for News and Sports.

The early Internet was confounded by weak browsers (no cookies), slow connections (14.4 Kbps modems), slow computers (pre-Pentium microprocessors), inconvient connectivity (dial-up), and a lack of strong development tools (no Java).

Mobile applications are hindered by weak browsers (no cookies), slow connections, expensive data plans ($20/month), lack of keyboard/mouse, lack of screen real estate, lack of processing power, and lack of memory.

So why am I bullish on mobile commerce? Moore's Law.

The average American consumer has a phone that:
- has minimal memory (10MB)for data storage,
- a tiny 2.2" 176 * 220 pixel screen, and
- has no QUERTY keyboard.
(ex: Motorola RAZR V3 - considered state of the art 2 years ago)

Compare that to the latest and greatest now available:
- 8GB storage,
- 3.5" 480 * 320 pixel screen,
- touch screen for navigation, and
- a touch screen QUERY keyboard system.
(ex: Apple iPhone)

More importantly, smartphone sales in the US grew 165% in the US year-over-year during for the third quarter of 2007. That comprised 11% of all mobile phone sales in the US. Source: http://blog.wired.com/business/2007/11/smartphone-sale.html.

In the next 1-2 years, Moore's Law will deliver us:
- low-cost smartphones,
- robust mobile processing power,
- advanced web-browsers,
- massive data storage, and
- broadband like data connectivity.

Due to the widespead adoption of smartphones, data plans will plummet in price and the mobile web will transition from cutting edge to everyday usage.

It took a while before the web evolved to deliver e-commerce on a significant scale. Today, e-commerce has redefined how Americans shop. Mobile commerce will be equally impactful and will provide consumers with friction-free transactions. A killer mobile-commerce application will have to contend with the inherent limitations of a mobile phone (screen size, keyboard size), and therefore will have to provide a faster simplier shopping experience than a full-fledged e-commerce transaction. Although there has been some success with text messaging based mobile commerce, there is reason to believe that consumers will far prefer a graphical user interface (GUI)-based mobile commerce tranasction.

When was the last time you heard someone long to go back to the days of DOS?

Expect smartphones and GUI-based mobile applications to put text-messaging based mobile commerce solutions out to pasture. Moore's Law is coming to mobile and not a moment too soon.