Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Google (Finally) Makes Its Major Announcement



Undoubtedly, some of the biggest news stories that has happened in the past few weeks is the exciting announcements that Google has made regarding its new mobile wallet offering.In many ways, Google is doing all that ISIS had hoped to do (more on ISIS and its failure in the next post)- it's new, shiny, it comes from one of the most beloved (and controversial) tech companies in Silicon Valley, and it offers a way to pay, a way to get coupons and has all of the buy in to boot. (Currently, Google has announced that its a partnership with Mastercard, FirstData, Citi and Sprint. They will fill the roles of (assuming) the payer/issuer, the PCI/security player, a bank/issuer and a MNO. Recently, VeriFone also signed on to help provide the POS systems.)

The beauty of the Google Wallet system is that the two major problems- merchant acceptance (due to high POS costs) and customer adoption are addressed in one fell swoop. Google has tried to its darndest to make sure that all merchants who want them receive subsidized (free) POS systems, and that on top of that, the pilot will begin in stores that already have NFC-enabled systems. As for customer adoption, by offering coupons to its customers (thanks to Google's amazing volume and incredibly targeted customer data analytics) they're already beginning to edge in on things that Groupon and LivingSocial have been trying so desperately to protect. Groupon and LivingSocial have recently launched pilots that allow users to find "instant deals" in their neighborhoods that are specific to the time they look and the immediate are that they are in- however, I'm beginning to question how they believe that they could compete with Google.

Google as a company is going to be a hard competitor to beat because it made all of its back-end "treatment personalization" enablers ahead of time. (Pymnts.com agrees with me in "Googling mPayments Ignition? Why Google's Wallet May Be the Top Search Result".) It has prided itself for a very long time in providing open, free, multi-channel platforms to the public. The official party line is that they do this because this is what they enjoy doing and this is what they expect from themselves as innovation leaders in the field of...well, everything. Thinking about the things that Google does, there's not much that they don't already do (and therefore, know about its customers). They have email, calendaring, they have documents for collaborative use. They recently launched a new service specifically for non-profit organizations, one that undoubtedly they will leverage to see what other services they can offer to small businesses and not so small businesses. Currently, these business offerings are mostly in the form of receiving payments (Google Checkout) and collaboration (calendaring, Google Docs), but by stepping into the mobile payments space, its clear that Google is not ready to be relegated to the virtual space. Add to that Google's amazing prowess at advertising (90% of its revenue comes from ads) and it's related customer analytics teams. And to finish it off, they have an army of developers dying to program for them, an exploding mobile OS system (the Android system- fast outpacing Apple's iPhone, especially in "personal phones" aka phones not given to people by their company), an army of mobile devices to choose from and strong customer adoption in its Google Maps and Google Search capabilities, and you've got a serious behemoth on your hands.

There are a couple of interesting things to note about this new offering though- only one of which is the chosen carrier of Sprint....So let's start there. As a Sprint customer myself, I feel bad being ashamed of my MNO, but Sprint has had hard times! It's stock price is pretty low, it is estimated to only have about 11% of the carrier market (a distant competitor behind Verizon/AT&T and T-Mobile) and it has had a history of really, really (really really really really) terrible customer service. So this is an interesting choice- I would imagine that they were chosen because they were "easy pickins" for Google. Google knew that with AT&T/Verizon and T-Mobile tied up with ISIS it was unlikely that they would be willing to leave to join Google, Sprint was really its only option. Others would argue though that Sprint has been positioning for a really long time to come back in a big way. Not only has Sprint been one of the first to offer 4G network in major cities and offer the newest (specifically Droid) phones, but they are continuing to offer the newest phones, but some of the newest phones (like the Thunderbolt) are on Verizon- so what gives? Potentially, this could be a strategic move by Google to "get" even the MNOs that aren't directly participating in their wallet solution, thereby gaining an edge on ISIS. (Verizon can't NOT offer the Thunderbolt, but if Google is going to offer a wallet, from a customer's perspective, why would you use ISIS if you could use the service that is made for your type of phone?)

Either way, it'll definitely be something that people continue to keep an eye on. My prediction is that Google will begin to edge into the cloud space (it already does have cloud-based computing with it's Google Docs, but..) particularly in the music/entertainment area. (It already owns YouTube, if it could sign some sort of Warner Brothers-type contract like Facebook did...or just partner with Facebook, then it would REALLY be unstoppable.) More to come, I'm sure!

Running Toward Hectic Times



So in a completely random bit of news today, I was trying to catch up on my news reading and (yeah yeah, I know crazy things are happening on the Visa/Google/Mastercard, etc. front, but I'm going to get to that shortly) I came across this article from the New York Times, talking about the most popular term in the dictionary. Entitled "Run', a Verb for our Frantic Times", the article talks about how in the past, the most "meaningful" word (they define it as the word that has the most unique meanings) was "put" and then "set". Now, the word is "run". Take the following paragraph for example:
HER birthday: must set plans in motion. Run a bath, put on cologne, set the table. High anxiety. Run down list: set watch again, put water in glasses, set flowers. Run to the window — phew! Watch her put a finger to the doorbell. Such joy! What timing! And just as the sun sets, too!
There are so many different versions of "put", "set" and "run", you can see how this could happen. But the article ponders (as do I) whether the new popularity of "run" is due to the increasingly technological world that we live- apps run on devices, clouds run companies, you need to run materials by someone, you need to run a meeting and eventually, you run yourself ragged... In all the senses that I can think of, it implies that if the most meaningful world is any indicator of the world that we live, it tells me that we are increasingly collaborative, increasingly "up"(good things) and increasingly "on" and getting increasingly global (some questionable things).

Nevertheless, an interesting read...

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Facebook Feeling A Little Insecure

Is it just me, or does it seem to everyone else that the only names we hear about anymore in the news are Google, Facebook, Amazon and Apple? Repeat as necessary....

So news about security has been all over the place recently- and no wonder- especially as our devices begin to take over our lives (slowly but surely) and mobile everything becomes the accepted lifestyle, people naturally begin to wonder...."So what happens with all of the information that I put out there?". I think it's not debate-able that there is more information out there now than there ever was before about every single one of us, and while some people simply chalk it up to "well that's how the times are changin'...." there are definitely a whole other group of people who are getting increasingly concerned about this turn of events. Don't believe me? If you're a Google user, go ahead and head over to the Google Dashboard and check out what Google knows about you- it's legit- it was featured in BusinessWeek a few years ago. Not only are they tracking your preferences and interests, they also consolidate that the information you offer about yourself (through emails, calendars,etc.) in a "Google Dashboard" (www.google.com/dashboard).

The most recent villain in this game though seems ironic- since they also capitalize on the amount of information that they know about each of us. Facebook actually has been accused of trying to hire ghostwriters with the express intent of getting them to write negative things about Google's new search capability called "Social Circle". Supposedly, Social Circle would allow users to search for something like "Restaurants in Chicago" and be able to pull up a list of what their friends were saying related to this topic by pulling from public social media feeds such as Facebook, Yelp or LinkedIn. However, the only way this can happen is if users link Google to their social media feeds. Otherwise, your post about what you had for breakfast is safe from the prying eyes of....your friends?

Speaking of the Google blitz, Google has been quite busy recently! Not only have they recently unleashed the new "tagging" feature in Gmail, where users can "tag" certain messages to be important or not, it has also been making huge strides in expanding it's Android market storefront. They recently released a bunch of new functionalities at the annual I/O developer conference which all are supposed to improve a consumer's ability to find new apps- including revised top app charts and improvements in their "related apps" feed, which will show trending download volume, related apps by people who've downloaded a certain app, etc. And Android is certainly taking off! Currently, Android is expected to have more than 100M devices worldwide and adds 400K new activations every day. With a wide selection of 310 Android devices, it is available in 112 countries across 215 MNOs. The Android Market itself boasts 200K apps, which consumers have installed more than 4.5B times.... With numbers like these, I guess you can afford to have Facebook take a swipe at you every now and then...

Getting back to the privacy issue. Apple landed in hot water recently when there was an accusation of Apple secretly tracking its customers through the GPS devices on their cell phones. They finally issued a statement saying that they were not tracking the location of cell phones (and were never planning to) and that the only file that was located in their OS was put there to retrieve satellite data faster- cutting the load time from a few minutes to seconds. Although I have to say it wouldn't be surprising if they were tracking data, I actually believe them on this one. They have a lot of other ways to find out information about you if they really wanted- not just through the location of your cell phone...If I were Apple- I would definitely target iTunes accounts first if I wanted information. It actually got so bad that Steve Jobs himself had to start grand standing- being very clear by announcing that "We don't track anyone" (which I don't believe). I mean c'mon! If you're Apple, you're tracking somebody- you probably just figure that location data is small peanuts for what you could really do...am I right? (I think it's pretty funny to note that pretty much simultaneously as this is happening, Senators have "conveniently" began to lobby for smartphone location tracking laws.) They're not really asking for much- and this regulation can't be a surprise- the mobile industry is long overdue for some official privacy/security standards (I mean, you can use your mobile phone to find a parking spot for the love of...). Unsurprisingly, Apple and Google were called in front of the Senate panel to outline their location tracking policies in front of the law makers. This occurred just days after the FCC announced that it would host a consumer forum on mobile location data (can we just call this the Apple syndrome and get it over with?).

In a statement the FCC said, "Over the last few years, [location-based services] have become an important part of the mobile market and a boon to the economy. Commercial location-based services include applications that help consumers find the lowest priced product nearby or the nearest restaurant...But recent reports have raised concerns about the location-based information that is gathered when consumers use mobile devices.

Saturday, May 21, 2011

The Good, The Bad, and The People Who Don't Learn From Their Mistakes


One of the biggest news stories recently has been all about Dominque Strauss-Kahn. Recently, the managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) was accused (and subsequently indicted) on an attempted rape of a maid in a high-end Manhattan hotel. As the story unfolded, more and more came out about Dominique's life, and it suddenly became clear that this is a guy who doesn't have a completely clean past.

BUT, this man was the same man who was expected to be the socialist candidate for the French presidency! How could everyone look past all of his shadiness to allow him to become such an increasingly powerful person? Of course, the New York Times did a little bit of digging and came up with an inflammatory article around how women at the IMF are helpless in the eyes of the predatory gazes of the men who work there. Although its clear that some of the facts are purposely placed to cause shock and awe (and probably don't have a strong base in fact) other facts are surprisingly spot on. NYTimes claims:

Interviews and documents paint a picture of the fund as an institution whose sexual norms and customs are markedly different from those of Washington, leaving its female employees vulnerable to harassment. The laws of the United States do not apply inside its walls, and until earlier this month the I.M.F.’s own rules contained an unusual provision that some experts and former officials say has encouraged managers to pursue the women who work for them: “Intimate personal relationships between supervisors and subordinates do not, in themselves, constitute harassment.”
“It’s sort of like ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’; the rules are more like guidelines,” said Carmen M. Reinhart, a prominent female economist who served as the I.M.F.’s deputy director for research from 2001 to 2003. “That sets the stage, I think, for more risk-taking.”

The article goes on to insinuate that it might have something to do with the demographic of the institution itself- citing that:
In recent years the fund has tried to diversify by hiring more women, Even so, only six of the I.M.F.’s 30 senior executives are women. Only 21.5 percent of all managers at the fund are women, compared with 32 percent at its sister institution, the World Bank, and 26 percent at the United Nations secretariat.
 Even the whole process itself is suspect. Supposedly, the actual incident happened in the middle of the afternoon- around 1PM- on Saturday. Dominique wasn't actually arrested until 2:15AM on Sunday, but he was taken off an Air France plane right before he was supposed to board a plane to go back to France. Why wouldn't, actually, why couldn't we have stopped him earlier? After the arrest, the NYPD got a lot of heat because they forced Dominique to do the "perp walk"- basically (gasp) handcuffing him and leading him to a police car in public. I'm personally with the NYPD on this one- they were doing things as they normally would for anyone accused of rape. Some say that it was unnecessary since the charges had not been proven and he's such a high-ranking, public figure. My response to that is, so now we're protecting the powerful against the public perception of them being terrible people when they're accused of being terrible people? It's a thin line I agree, but in this case I think it was understandable.

After his arrest, Dominique stepped down from his position at the IMF, but released a statement that he denied all of the accusations, but was stepping down to devote all of his time to prove his innocence. This, after he stepped out of the shower naked, sexually assaulted the maid, and, when she broke free, caught her and dragged her back to the bathroom where he assaulted her a second time. She finally broke free and immediately called 911. Yup, sounds pretty innocent to me. He claims it was consensual- doesn't the consensual nature stop when she runs away?

After all of this, when officials came to his hotel, they found it empty, as he was already on the Air France plane. However, the plane had been grounded, and he was luckily taken off the plane and into custody.  Through all of this, Dominique's wife has decided to stand by her man. A former television journalist, Dominique's wife Anne Sinclair was a celebrity who conducted over 500 interviews with politicians and important people all around the world.Weird thing is that this isn't the first time this has happened, as Dominique had an affair with an IMF staffer named Piroska Nagy in 2008. Afterward, he [unsurprisingly] kept his job.

Maybe I'm just a little too sensitive, a little too close, to how (sorry, but typically male) leaders abuse their power. I do want to mention that this is one of those unfortunate cases where the minority becomes representative of the majority- however unfair that may be. I work with many male leaders who I have nothing but respect for- true men who know that even with their power, they too need to abide by rules and restrictions and they are not exempt. To those men, I want to say thank you for being role models for others. For the others, I think their actions make it clear that they are not real men, and I don't think there's enough punishment in the world to cover their abuses- because it's not just their repugnant actions, it's also their mentality that it's somehow "okay" because of who they are. That's what the punishment should be for, because no one should be beyond the rules.

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Mobile News Roundup! Mobile Payments, Banking, Marketing and Other Stuff!

From the big guys to the small guys- there's exciting stuff all over the place.

  • Venmo came out and took a strong stand against the PayPal's of the world by offering a simplistic, easy to use P2P system. Although founder Andrew Kortina admits that there's a lot of value for the PayPal app
  • Speaking of the little guys, TabbedOut (based in Austin, TX), has signed a deal with MICROS systems to enable its services to more than 330K systems in over 130 countries. Tabbedout has announced that it's raised $3.7M in venture backing, which brings its Series A funding to a total of $5.75M. Tabbedout's services features encrypted credit card information on users' phones
  • Digimo also joins the mobile payments revolution with low-cost, rapid deployment solution. It's already available for immediate deployment worldwide, and only requires users to register for the service online (supply their preferred billing method and phone number), receive a PIN, and they're good to go. Primarily designed for online giants, credit card companies and mobile operators, this solution hopes to offer a service at retailers without requiring POS integration at each one
  • Speaking of POS systems, the Justice Department just filed an antitrust lawsuit to stop Verifone from buying Hypercom and entering into anti-competitive contracts with Ingenico (largest provider of POS terminals worldwide). The department said that the proposed deal would substantially lessen the competition in the POS terminals in the US, resulting in higher prices and reduced innovation, quality, product variety and service.
  • Citi Tap and Pay finally released their findings from a Bengaluru pilot in 2009. The pilot was rolled out to over 3K customers, 250 merchants and accumulated over 50K purchases in 26 weeks. Some of the highlights of the report indicate that secure/hassle free activation and enhancement in transaction speed scored positively with customers and encouraged usage
  • And, if you've missed it, Google has announced that it's developing NFC solutions for retailers- working with Ingenico to develop NFC-based services for retailers. Google is hoping to deliver coupons, and currently has stated that it's not currently planning on moving into the payments sector, but it's really only a matter of time...

Moving back to the realm of mobile banking:
  • Smart has begun encouraging customers to bank online (particularly in the bill payments section)-with an estimated 45.6M Smart subscribers as of December 2010, all consumers have to do is link their bank account to their mobile phones (one-time transaction) to allow for mobile banking services
  • And in a funny (kind of) twist of fate, due to the big mobile push in Korea, banks have noticed that consumers are actually pushing back and (sometimes) preferring old banking methods. The press release states that "Because of growing concerns over security breaches in the banking sector, an increasing number of clients are shunning modern conveniences such as mobile and online banking services in favor of more secure 'security accounts'". In addition, these security accounts require customers to make financial transaction in person by physically going to a bank or through an automated teller machine (ATM). Internet and mobile banking is not permitted.

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Osama Bin Laden- World's Most Wanted Man- Now Dead



Undoubtedly, one of the biggest news stories recently is the death of Osama Bin Laden. Announced around the night of May 1st, President Obama held an impromptu press conference to announce that Osama Bin Laden "was killed in a firefight with United States forces in Pakistan". In the New York Times report, Obama claimed that "justice has been done" and that the body had been buried at sea. He also explained that they had first received leads late last summer and had finally tracked him to a comfortable mansion in Pakistan. Supposedly the operation was actually quite efficient, killing only three other people (one believed to be his son, the other two his couriers) and the burial at sea was justified as a way to avoid his followers building him a shrine.

On one hand, it seems that Americans are largely relieved- and as a people, we seem jubilant. Understandable, because this seems to prove to the world that "America always gets her man". That there really is nowhere to hide, and that, after 9/11, justice is being done for all of the lives that were ruined that day. Obama has seen a significant increase in poll numbers after this Bin Laden raid. Initial response in New York, the city that has to see ground zero every day, was borderline gleeful, and students gathered outside the White House shortly after the announcement, chanting "USA! USA!". Mayor Bloomberg commented that "New Yorkers have waited nearly 10 years for this news. It is my hope that it will bring some closure and comfort to all of those who lost loved ones on September 11, 2001."

However, there are concerns about a backlash throughout the middle east due to this raid, and the long term impact against terrorism has been called into question as new successors are already being appointed. As it is, Al-Qaeda has confirmed Osama's death and has already vowed a retaliation against the United States for his death. The statement, released on jihadist sites stated that Bin Laden's blood will "be a curse that chases the Americans and their agents, and goes after them inside and outside their countries" and that "Soon- with help from Allah [American's] happiness will turn into sorrow, and their blood will be mixed with their tears. We will fulfill the oath of Sheikh Osama, may Allah have mercy on him: America and those who live in America will never enjoy security until our people in Palestine enjoy it".


I worry though, if maybe we are all celebrating a bit prematurely. In fact, Osama's successor has already been somewhat implied. Washington Post reports that there has been speculation that a man by the name of Ayman Al Zawahiri, an Egyptian surgeon and bin Laden's longtime deputy will take over as the al-Qaeda leader. My thoughts are more in line with Harry Waizer, a survivor that was interviewed for the New York Times.When interviewed, he stated, "If this means there is one less death in the future, then I'm glad for that. But I just can't find it in me to be glad one more person is dead, even if it is Osama Bin Laden". After all of the trauma that the American people have been through I feel justified with the death of Osama bin Laden, but I find it difficult to celebrate death, even if it is his. I feel like after all of the sadness in our post-9/11 world, maybe we should look forward instead of focusing on and celebrating the continuing death.

ISIS- No Dial Tone?



So the most recent news on the scene is that operators are scaling back the ISIS m-commerce network in light of all the new NFC competition. Reported on May 4th, Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile are dramatically scaling back the scope of ISIS, forgoing mobile POS transactions for "mobile wallet" methods to store and exchange consumers existing credit card account information.

Some cite that it was the lack of collaboration with major issuers that held them back, stating that the three operator partners are only now in talks with Visa and MasterCard to get their cooperation in bringing them into the ISIS equation. mFoundry CEO and co-founder, Drew Sievers, commented "The carriers have to include MasterCard and Visa. Not including the 800 pound gorillas of the industry will make it very hard to succeed."

I can't help but think that this is also somehow connected to all of the big announcements that have been coming out recently. RIM just announced that the new Blackberry Bolds would have NFC capabilities, Google has not only added NFC capabilities to its Android operating system, but has also announced that they're going to help subsidize the cost of POS readers for merchants, Apple has partnered with Square and Visa to sell Square credit card readers. Overall it seems like the market is getting increasingly saturated, and even though ISIS' original strength was its multiple point buy-in from players across the value chain, it seems that overlooking major issuers (Visa and MasterCard) was a huge mistake. In addition, I can't help but wonder if they're also forgetting getting major merchants involved. Granted, they can probably rely on the consumer push to force merchant adoption, but couldn't they forgo the pain and hassle and go the more "Google" way in appealing directly to major merchants themselves?

Monday, May 2, 2011

If You're Young...Well At Least You Have Your Youth




I was leafing through The Economist (you like how I randomly decide to underline, put quotation marks, or italicize the publications I read? Someday I'll standardize it and do it correctly like I was taught to cite in high school, but I like doing it wrong on purpose. It makes me feel like I'm rebelling against The Man) and a couple of their articles grabbed my attention. Mostly because it made me realize that if I'm young, I'm pretty much looking at a dismal existence. Seriously!

So one of their first articles was about the increasing costs of undergraduate programs (duh). In Britain (wait, what?). The article, entitled "Race to the Top" profiled how the increase in annual tuition fees could potentially have wide ranging impacts on higher education (perhaps a watered down market on "new talent"?) one of which would be the increasing pressure on tuition prices to,well, increase. Their argument goes something like this: tuition continues to increase while, simultaneously, students see degrees as the key to a decent paying job. Undergraduate degrees are subsidized but MBAs aren't and this leads to students to choose between options (expensive, not expensive) instead of ruling our the idea of business school altogether. This practice, as a result, has left politicians in a bit of a tizzy because although their undergraduate universities are consistently expensive, they remain popular because the government provides subsidies, and no one wants to announce that they are against subsidizing undergraduate education. However, there have been no regulations around master's degrees and doctorates, so there are no limits on what universities can charge, thus, this has made affordability the main focus of these circles.

This is all very interesting. I can't help but wonder what would happen if the U.S. provided subsidies for people to study. I was lucky enough to get a scholarship, or I may not have been able to go to undergraduate school (as my mom said, "You can get a scholarship, or you can go to community college. We can't really afford other options.") but how could a new model potentially change the system? Either way, what brings me to this article is that the numbers that they were calling "expensive" shocked me. The maximum for undergraduate tuition permitted by the state if apparently $14,500, students don't need to start repayment until they have graduated and are earning more than (approximately) $42,000. 85% of English universities offer master's degrees for less than ~$18,000. I feel like I'm getting the short end of the stick. Without scholarship, my undergraduate education could have been $46,000 a year. The schools I'm looking at for my MBA are in the mid to high 40s. For two years, people are telling me to expect to spend anywhere from ~$120,000 to ~$180,000. Easy. I'm moving across the pond.

A few pages later, there was an article entitled "Inferno for Interns". In this article, they spoke about the unpaid internship craze that is taking over the business world. "With ever fewer entry-level jobs in many industries, internships have become a critical first step into employment." The Economist estimates that U.S. organizations save $2 billion dollars a year by not paying interns a minimum wage. They estimate that perhaps one third of all internships at for-profit companies are unpaid (by the company) and interns now often fill roles once held by full-time employees. So you're telling me that, even potentially with that coveted business degree I so desperately want, I might still be taking unpaid internships in the thin hope that I could be taken in out of the cold after graduation? Well, at least they predict that employers are intending to hire 19% more graduates this year than last...