MoviePass – Ads or death.

Reply to this post           MoviePass has to track to survive. Unless MoviePass tracks its members and is able to monetise the data that they generate, the company is almost certain to go out of business as I think that its model is fundamentally flawed. MoviePass is a service that normally costs $9.95 per month and...

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Spotify – Straight record.

Reply to this post           Improvement masked by debt slip-up. Spotify will be going public in a somewhat unorthodox fashion next month, but the financial position of the company is not nearly as bad as many commentators have concluded as fundamental profitability is improving, albeit slowly. Most companies list via an Initial Public Offering (IPO) where...

Digital Assistants – Google’s game

Reply to this post           Usage patterns of smart speakers strengthen Google’s position. Although Amazon remains dominant in terms of the installed base, the usage patterns are overwhelmingly in Google’s favour which I continue to believe will lead to its eventual victory. The latest survey by voicebot.ai reveals that 47.3m adults or 19.7% of the population...

Android – P is for pointless

Reply to this post           5 years to do what takes Apple 90 days. Google has released the Android developer preview for Android P (version 9.0) with a series of new features that will take about 5 and half years to fully penetrate Google’s own ecosystem devices. By contrast, it takes Apple less than 90 days...

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Geneva Auto Show – Own goals

Reply to this post           OEMs promote their own demise. While the automakers are falling over themselves to appear up to date and innovative at the Geneva Motor Show, very little thought appears to have been applied to considering the consequences of their actions. I see these consequences as potentially devastating for the long-term differentiation, growth...

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HTC Virtual Reality – Repeated history

Reply to this post           HTC Vive loses out to Oculus. While penetration of VR units in the gaming community remains pathetically low, Oculus has edged out HTC potentially spelling the end of a once great smartphone company. The latest data from Steam indicates: First, penetration: this remains very low at 0.14% of all PCs surveyed....

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Google vs. Amazon – Battle for the smart home pt. VIII

Reply to this post           Google booted from the nest. The tit for tat war between Amazon and Google (which I thought had been largely resolved (see here)), has been brought back to life with the almost certainty that Google’s smart home products will no longer be sold on Amazon. This has re-emerged as Amazon has...

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MWC Day 2/3 – Uncovered issues

Reply to this post           Relevant items outside the usual MWC news flow. Google – Stairway to heaven. Google as taken a small step that may herald the end of Android and the arrival of a new OS that could end the endemic fragmentation that plagues Google devices. This is a development environment called Flutter that...

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MWC Day 1 –Going bananas.

Reply to this post           MWC retro mania continues (except 5G). Android dullness alleviated by a banana. HMD (Nokia) has once again laid bare how dull the world of smartphones is these days with its relaunch of the 8110, better known as the banana phone. It is a re-imagining of the original device which was hugely...

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MWC Day 0 – Halcyon days.

Reply to this post           MWC goes back to its roots. MWC has stopped wanting to be CES and is instead reclaiming its identity as a show all about phones and the boxes that connect them to the world. Sunday saw the release of 4 phones from HMD (Nokia), 3 from ZTE, 2 from Samsung, tablets...