Quadriga Consulting and Verge Research Partner to Define Fifth Wave

Reblogged from Mobile Cloud:

Quadriga Consulting, the UK based mobile cloud research consultancy, has joined forces with identity market intelligence firm Verge Research, based in Arlington, MA. Both firms are launching a new multi-client research program designed to map out the future for mobile cloud and mobile cloud identity. Quadriga Consulting, last year, ran Europe’s first Mobile Cloud Summit – that attracted some of the leaders in mobile cloud technologies to debate how mobility and cloud computing were coalescing to drive …

The World’s Top 10 Websites

World Top 10 Internet Sites: By Daily Page Views. Source Wolfram Alpha

Just a few weeks before its IPO, Facebook is hot on the heels of Google – vying to become the world’s most visited website.

According to Wolfram Alpha, Facebook is neck and neck with Google in terms of daily page views.  Although it’s well behind based on daily visitors.

However, some commentators have been questioning how Facebook defines monthly active users (MAUs) in its investment prospectus – recently filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission – such as this  article in the New York Times:

Facebook counts as “active” users who go to its Web site or its mobile site. But it also counts an entire other category of people who don’t click on facebook.com as “active users.” According to the company, a user is considered active if he or she “took an action to share content or activity with his or her Facebook friends or connections via a third-party Web site that is integrated with Facebook.”

UK Banks Lagging in Mobile Banking?

25 per cent of UK mobile internet users now use mobile banking services, according to YouGov research data released by mobile software house Antenna.  According to the firm, “a separate study revealed that only four out of 14 high street banks surveyed offer a dedicated mobile banking app. This may explain why the YouGov research found that three times as many UK mobile internet users use mobile websites most frequently for mobile banking (15%) as opposed to apps (5%) with 6 per cent preferring to use both equally. This contrasts with the US, where banking apps and mobile websites are used almost equally by mobile internet users (13% and 16% respectively), with 8 per cent using them the same amount and the majority of banks offering dedicated mobile banking apps.”

The Antenna research found that young people are driving adoption in the UK – with 30% of 18-24 year old and 33 per cent of 25-34 year old mobile internet users utilising mobile banking to manage their money on the go – compared to 13 per cent of over 55s.

Antenna’s research also assessed the barriers to take-up, and found that 69 per cent of UK mobile internet users have security concerns about mobile banking services saying they would stop using the service if they felt their data was not secure. These concerns could account for the unpopularity of third-party banking apps, with only one per cent of respondents in the US, and less than one per cent of those polled in the UK, admitting to preferring to use a banking app not provided by their own bank.

READ THE FULL FINDINGS AND METHODOLOGY HERE…

 

The Future of Mobile Imaging?

I received a link to this video from Scalado’s PR department just this morning.  Scalado is a mobile cloud software vendor based in Lund, Sweden.

We don’t normally republish media announcements or releases but if Scalado delivers everything it promises in this video it’s going to be quite a product.  Fun video.

PRs and the Board

I love PR (public relations)

Image by DoktorSpinn via Flickr

I received a mailer today from the CIPR (the outfit that represents a good chunk of the professional UK PR industry) and it contained the following entreaty to PR professionals:

If the role of the comms department is to move beyond being a glorified press office, it needs to take a more robust data driven/evidence-based approach to planning, strategic communications and reputation management…only then will that vacant seat at the board room table be filled.” (Andrew Bruce Smith, CIPR).

Well said Andrew Bruce Smith.

Here at Quadriga Consulting | Business Evidence we’re in the business of providing the “evidence based approach to planning, strategic communications and reputation management”.  So if you’re a PR professional and feel that you need to improve your prospects of getting a seat on the Board then give us a call.

Jeff Peel

Tweeting more for Chicks

As this is a business focused site we’d blush to suggest that social networking sites might be used to develop romantic liaisons – but some research from the Pew Research centre suggests that if you’re looking for a member of the opposite sex, some sites will offer more choice than others. (And, depending on your choice, more or less competition).

The Centre’s study ‘Social Networking sites and our lives‘ reveals that women outnumber men on Twitter by nearly 2:1. Whereas over on social-climbing site Linkedin, the reverse situation is true. The latter revelation may indicate that women are less interested in business networking via social media – or perhaps there’s just not as many of them in business to network.

However, right across the social networking piste women are in the social networking majority (with the obvious exception of Linkedin).

Read the full report.

CIOs Drive Cloud Mainstream

Cloud computing icon

Image via Wikipedia

A recent survey of IT leaders in the USA has concluded that cloud computing is ‘practically mainstream’.  The latest CIO Economic Impact survey of 291 IT leaders has found that nearly half (48 percent) of the CIOs surveyed said they have adopted a “cloud first” policy.  This requires cloud options to be given priority over more traditional computing solutions, for new information solutions.

The survey findings indicate that cloud budgets are beginning to reflect the shift, with 48 percent of IT leaders putting more money into cloud, up from 44 percent in November 2010 and 38 percent in August 2010. According to the report, “More than half (53 percent) of CIOs said they expect to increase their IT budgets overall, up 5 percent from a year ago.”

Are you interested in cloud computing and mobile cloud?  Our Mobile Cloud Summit event is taking place in September.

G8 Gets iPad App

45th Munich Security Conference 2009: Dr. Ange...

Nicolas Sarkozy to launch eG8 Forum - Image via Wikipedia

The Paris based Mobile Network Group (MNG) today announced the launch of the iPad app for the e-G8 Forum (ww.eg8forum.com), a summit on the global digital economy to be launched by French president Nicolas Sarkozy on May 24-25 – prior to the G8 Summit to be held in Deauville on May 26-27.

The iPad app is the first to be created specifically for a global digital forum, and was created in conjunction with fellow French mobile developer firms BeTomorrow and Moben Fact. The e-G8 Forum iPad app (e-G8 Data) can be downloaded from the Apple App Store.

The e-G8 Data iPad app enables users to scan data on Internet penetration and usage from all G20 countries, and provides information on the key figures in the Internet economy of each nation. Prominent Internet leaders including Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg; Google’s Eric Schmidt; and Amazon.com’s Jeffrey Bezos will speak at the e-G8 Forum on the Internet’s impact on the global economy and society.

Panelists will also address the social and political issues that underlie the development of digital technologies, including privacy rights, intellectual property, human rights and democratization through information.

(Paul Amsellem, CEO of Mobile Network Group, will be a speaker and panelist at the Quadriga Consulting|Business Evidence conference, Mobile Cloud Summit, in September).

The Twin Peaks of Video Gaming Fear

I stumbled across this TED talk by David McCandless, just a moment or so ago. While some presentations on data visualization seem to focus on the visualization technique (big, animated bubbles etc.) David seems to love uncovering the hidden data.

At about 4 minutes into the presentation he asks why there should be “twin peaks” of fear about video gaming – in April and November.  Watch the video for the answer.

Who Needs Evidence?

Tim Harford, Undercover Economist

This article by Tim Harford in Saturday’s FT generated more Twitter retweets than anything he has ever written. I can understand why.  Well said Tim. Here’s my favourite quote from the piece…

Evidence is the way to reduce honest doubts. Stuffed on a fattening diet of certitude, who has room for doubt? And if we have no doubts, who needs evidence?

This reminds me of a wonderful quote attributed to the Nobel Physicist Richard Feynmann: “It’s much more interesting not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong.”

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