How mobile payments will impact future of banks, banking, back end payment processing, credit card transactions and retail customer spending. Smartphones using encryption and biometrics will enable telecom companies to compete with banks and credit card companies for retail payment transactions. Expect wireless payments using smartphones to grow rapidly. Despite this, some customers will continue to prefer cash because it allows anonymous purchases and is convenient for smaller purchases. Mobile payments could generate commissions of up to EU2 billion a year in countries like France, Germany, Italy and the UK. What would happen if -- say -- Vodafone formed a partnership with Google, Nokia and American Express? Implications for financial services, small loans, large ticket purchases of white goods, cars and other big items. Conference keynote speaker and Futurist Patrick Dixon speaking at retail trends conference for Hermes clients. Future of banking and financial services.

Innovation means doing things differently to serve customers better. How to innovate and why all innovation is about divergence not convergence. Innovation that simply imitates competitors, product features, design or brand elements, just means that all products and services look identical in every way, which means you can only differentiate yourself from competition based on price. Long term sustainable competitive advantage will always come from finding new ways to excell, exceed customer expectations. Technigues for innovation including open innovation and crowdsourcing using wikipedia type models to solve complex innovation challenges. How to encourage innovative teams and processes. Conference keynote speaker and Futurist Patrick Dixon - lecture at Hermes client event for UK retailers on retail industry trends.

Retail impact of online price comparison using mobile devices, smartphones, aggregator sites. Shopping patterns and customer behaviour. Online sales growth from retail sites, where customers compare prices in stores or shopping malls and then buy online or from a competitor store nearby. Aggregator sites will grow rapidly, creating strong price competition, eroding viability of physical retail outlets, especially in electronic consumer goods, white label products, computers, textiles / fashion and in any other area where customers like to try before they buy.

How (not) to do video calls: virtual teams management advice - Leadershi...

10 billion App downloads - future growth of smartphones - Patrick Dixon

Future of mobile phones, smartphone downloads, mobile apps development. Comment by Futurist conference keynote speaker Patrick Dixon. Nokia v Apple, iphone, ipads, symbian, mobile windows, android and other operating systems. Consumer choices and communication lifestyle trends. How apps will be used in future and why manufacturers like mobile phone apps.

Environment, innovation, agility, business. Video of Patrick Dixon at Globe Forum 2009. Sustainable business and how green technology will help sustainability, climate change, global warming, water shortages, food shortages, transport, energy, fuel, cities. Future aviation, travel, rail, cars, tourism, corporate travel, heating, lighting, heat pumps. Solar cells, wind power, biofuels, alternatiive energy generation. Future of coil, oil, gas and nuclear power. Electric vehicles. Green living. Protecting rainforests. Why climate change and other sustainability issues can be solved.

Better and different -- convergence and divergence
http://www.globalchange.com Divergence or convergence? Consumer focus, IT systems, software and mobile phones. Multiple devices and systems. Multiple capabilities and features. Innovation, divergence, new products and services. Conference keynote speaker and Futurist Dr Patrick Dixon.

Banks will become phone companies and telecom companies will become banks. Mobile payment systems, micropayments, mobile phone credit card transactions and loans. Economic impact of remittances from foreign workers using SMS credit to avoid foreign exchange transaction costs. How biometrics fingerprint technology will allow large mobile phone payments. Commissions and interest charges on loans. Impact of revenues from American Express, Visa, Delta, Access, Mastercard moving to mobile phone transactions. Conference keynote speaker and Futurist Dr Patrick Dixon.

Many telecom companies are going to have to rethink their oursourcing and offshoring strategies in countries like India because of rapid wage inflation which is eroding cost differences, and making outsourcing less econonimically viable. Video comment by Dr Patrick Dixon

Bottom of pyramid and how most mobile phone sales in future will be to people on low incomes. Impact of SMS on personal and business life. Changes in consumer behaviour. Lecture for Dimension Data by Dr Patrick Dixon, Futurist, author Futurewise (more)

Disney has partnered with O2 now owned by Telefonica in Spain, to offer phones aimed at limiting what children can watch, for how long, and what they can spend.  They will be able to access content with all Disney’s best-loved characters.

66% of 10-15 year olds already have a mobile in the UK and there are already concerns about the potential longer term health risks of heavy use by children.  These have been added to by UK government health warnings about possible dangers to younger children from exposure to electromagnetic radiation.

At the same time the UK government recently announced a ban on new housing being built within a certain distance of overhead high voltage power cables after yet more studies suggesting a low-level cancer risk.

You can be sure that if more definite links emerge between mobile phone use and health damage such as cancer, that companies like Disney may come under a lot of pressure.

I wonder who is carrying their re-insurance risk?

The fact is that the known health risks are absolutely minimal and it is unlikely that new reports will change that dramatically.  But as we have seen the future is not about science nor technology:  it is about emotion.  There have already been a whole series of reports suggesting that high dose exposure to mobile phone radiation can affect living tissue, and it would not take many more to trigger parental concerns and even perhaps a class action suit (even if unlikely to succeed).

For more see:

 

http://www.globalchange.com/radiation.htm

 

Well don't say I didn't tell you.... FON is going to take over a lot of other people's worlds.


Accton and FON to set up WiFi joint venture in Taiwan: "Accton and FON to set up WiFi joint venture in Taiwan
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Irene Chen, Taipei; Steve Shen, DigiTimes.com [Thursday 8 June 2006]

Taiwan-based network-equipment maker Accton Technology yesterday announced that it will form a joint venture with Europe-based WISP (wireless Internet service provider) FON, to promote FON's WiFi services in Taiwan, with the new company to commence operations before the end of August.
FON's CEO Martin Varsavsky expects the joint venture will initially be able to attract 20,000 users in the Taiwan market.
Varsavsky also expected the number of users of FON's network and WiFi services to top one million worldwide by the end of 2007, up from the current level of 40,000.
FON plans to launch its exclusively designed wireless router, the La Fonera, in September of this year, with Accton being a major supplier of the device for FON, according to sources at Accton."

At Google Zeitgeist event in the UK a couple of weeks back I chaired a session on the future of telecom.  One of the participants was the founder of the new global free Wifi service called Fon, Martin Versavsky.  It works by allowing anyone who is part of Fon to use your own wireless router.  In return, you can use anyone else’s.

 

In just a few weeks Fon has more Wifi public access points than some of the largest telecom companies.

 

Non-Fon users can also sign on for a very low fee, part of which is kept by the person who provides the Wifi access, and the rest pays for the whole thing to go on running.

 

http://en.fon.com/

 

“FON is a Global Community of people who share WiFi. Share your WiFi broadband access at home/work and enjoy WiFi all over the world! FON: small cost, great benefit!

To become a Fonero, all you need to do is register with us on our website, have broadband connection, and download the FON Software onto your WiFi router. It’s that simple. Just share your connection and the rest of the Community shares back with you. Join FON and enjoy connecting from anywhere within the WiFi World.

To start sharing, set up your access point where you can receive the most coverage, generally close to the window or outside your home. The rest of the Community will be thankful.

The Team

The FON Team is lead by Martin Varsavsky. Varsavsky has gathered a team of expert Internet and wireless technical professionals.”

 

The future of the telecom industry in some ways is certain: continued fall of the costs of communications towards zero, with rapid growth in global bandwidth and access.

We can also be sure that wireless communications of all kinds will grow rapidly.

But at the same time, expect growing concerns about the longer term risks from high level or lengthy exposure to electromagnetic radiation. Expect to see more research papers suggesting direct effects on living tissue, with questions about relevance of these studies to human beings.