Credit card issuer American Express Co. said Wednesday it has hired former Sprint Nextel Corp. executive Daniel H. Schulman to lead a new business growth group ...

Schulman, 52, will be responsible for business development, mergers and acquisitions and global strategy to expand alternative mobile and online payment services and build revenue streams outside card and travel businesses. He will oversee online payments unit Revolution Money and the global prepaid business.

The new group he will head "is designed to extend our leadership into the world of alternative payments and create new fee-based revenue streams for the post-recession environment," Chairman and CEO Kenneth I. Chenault said in a statement.

I could have called it something else. But let's face it... alternative payments these days are related to mobile. There are other kinds (are there?) but we are mostly interested in the evolution of mobile as a vehicle for economic transactions. So AMEX is doing just that. Getting more serious about it and ensuring that their mobile strategy includes a way to purchase goods (and services?) while mobile and to make money off that service by charging fees.

Nothing new here. Keep moving along.

Longtime Internet pioneer, AOL today matured its mobile platform with a two new applications for Android handsets and an HTML5 version of the AOL Mobile website for smartphones. The new site — still found at http://m.aol.com — now supports richer content and media on handset browsers supporting HTML5. While it’s not surprising that AOL is looking to support advanced devices such as smartphones, the selection of Android over iPhone for the new software title is notable.

Speaking of Mobile Strategy...

It is an interesting choice and certainly not a bad one specifically due to the momentum of the Android platform. They can follow this with an iPhone app and not even miss a beat.

I like it because they are not following the crowd. It shows both leadership and independent thinking... Although we don't have visibility into all the reasons why AOL chose Android over the iPhone it does put a marker on the ground and shows they are thinking things through and not bowing down to the buzz.

I like it.

A few years ago in speaking with customers their priority for development was:
- BlackBerry
- iPhone

Then it became:
- iPhone
- Android
- BlackBerry

Will it soon become...
- Android
- iPhone
- ... and maybe BlackBerry?

SAP’s mobile strategy involves developing business apps for specific platforms such as Google Android and Apple iPhone. The company remains close-lipped about its Sybase acquisition.

Following SAP’s acquisition of mobile-technology provider Sybase, some have been wondering how the deal is going to affect the company’s mobile strategy going forward. While SAP executives are remaining close-lipped about the deal itself, and their intentions with Sybase’s assets, at least one was willing to talk to eWEEK about SAP’s mobile philosophy with regard to burgeoning platforms such as Google Android and the Apple iPhone.

“In the past 18 months, what we’ve been noticing is that device-specific experiences are the ones getting huge amounts of adoption,” George Mathew, SAP’s general vice president and general manager for Business Intelligence; In-Memory Analytics, said during a July 22 interview with eWEEK. “There is a real compelling strategy for us to create a minimum baseline for how BI content is more actively shared between devices; that’s the starting point for creating device-specific experiences.”

SAP’s $5.8 billion acquisition of Sybase, announced May 12, was widely regarded as the start of a major shift in the enterprise-software landscape. In addition to allowing SAP to stay competitive with Oracle via new revenue streams, it also opened the door for the company to consolidate and expand its mobile offerings via Sybase’s mobile technology.

“On first glance, this is clearly a strength-to-weakness deal. SAP’s annual sales and its market cap are both [more than 10] times the size of Sybase’s,” Pund-IT Research analyst Charles King wrote in a May 13 research note. “While SAP develops and delivers a wide range of enterprise business software solutions, Sybase’s offerings are skewed towards the global mobile market.”

The deal also marked the largest acquisition for SAP since its $6.7 billion purchase of business intelligence software producer BusinessObjects in 2008. Sybase had been an SAP strategic partner prior to the deal. When creating previous applications for BlackBerry, SAP had previously layered functionality atop a Sybase platform; if and when the acquisition is completed, Mathew suggested, functionality and platform will be consolidated under one roof.   

Mathew has noted a number of businesses incorporating both the iPhone and the iPad into their IT mobile infrastructure; to capitalize on that, SAP created a BusinessObjects Explorer for the iPhone, which Mathew claims had 80,000 downloads since its release. “We’re seeing an uptick for the iPad optimized version,” he said. “Now that we’re seeing adoption of Android devices into the enterprise, we’re going to be looking at a similar investment.”

When asked about the upcoming Windows Phone 7, though, Mathew seemed to take more of a wait-and-see approach. “It’s the same way I felt about Android last year,” he said. “I knew there were compelling reasons why it would make sense to invest in Android, but I was holding until there was reasonable momentum. Once there’s factual evidence about the market, then you’re able to move quickly.”

Even for larger companies such as SAP, then, it seems to come down to careful use of developer resources. “It’s not a question of how quickly you can build a mobile app,” Mathew said, “it’s about being judicious about where you make your investments. I’d rather make the ones for well-adapted devices.”

The number of U.S. adults who own mobile phones dropped markedly in 2010, falling to 74%, down from 85% in 2009. However, smartphone sales bucked the trend. About 20% of all U.S. adults now tote a smartphone, as do 27% of mobile phone owners. With about one in five consumers now using mobile banking, financial institutions must understand the mobile marketplace and deploy mobile‐banking platforms to serve customers who increasingly are choosing banks based on their mobile‐banking capabilities. Because only 18 of the top 40 U.S. banks now offer mobile banking, the time has come for financial institutions (FIs) to develop, improve upon, and deploy effective mobile‐banking strategies and solutions. Javelin’s “triple play” approach provides actionable steps that financial institutions can follow to increase mobile‐banking adoption and capitalize on the growing smartphone, “mobile‐banking friendly” segment.

Javelin analyzes the demographics and behaviors of mobile‐banking customers, mobile banking and smartphone adoption rates, mobile device offerings, carrier and model penetration, along with survey data that describes what consumers want and how they bank via mobile device. This report identifies key consumer segments to target, the most effective approach for reaching customers, and the features

Primary Questions:

• What does the mobile marketplace look like?
• What are the current adoption rates for mobile penetration, mobile banking, and both smartphone and feature phones?
• How does security factor into mobile banking?
• What do typical mobile bankers look like, and how do they behave?
• What is the best method to reach consumers on their mobile devices?
• How do different smartphones and their owners compare?
• Which smartphones are most used for mobile banking?
• Which carriers have the largest market share?
• What features and mobile capabilities do consumers desire?
• How should FIs prepare for the future of mobile banking?

I don't have access to the report... but I would venture a guess and say that some of the data presented in this report may help you decide as a Financial Institution how much weight (as part of your mobile strategy) you place on SMS Banking (or Text Banking) versus mobile browser and native applications.

I have more thoughts on this and I will expand on this any more topics related to mobile financial services over at the Mobile Strategy Blog (http://m-strat.org).

Be well!

In a press release this morning, MasterCard has announced that desktop and mobile developers will have access to an API from the credit card giant later this year. The company hopes that by opening its technology to developers, new and innovative e-commerce applications that leverage the MasterCard network will be created, potentially competing with the likes of Visa, PayPal and Square.

MasterCard Chief Innovation Officer Josh Peirez says the company is "excited about tapping into the ingenuity of software developers around the globe to help create the next generation of game-changing payment applications." A newly launched portal - MasterCard Labs - will give developers access to APIs, SDKs, guides and forums for discussing and experimenting with the company's technology.

The announcement comes at a time when the mobile-payments market has begun to heat up with competition between startups and large credit card providers. San Francisco-based startup Square has many people excited about its mobile application and dongle that allows credit cards to be scanned by various mobile devices; online payment staple PayPal recently teamed up with Bump Technologies to provide a mobile transaction service as well.

Visa also recently announced its own foray into the mobile payments market. Earlier this month, the MasterCard competitor teamed with DeviceFidelity to launch special cases for iPhones which would allow users to take advantage of Visa's wireless and contact-less payment method, Visa payWave, straight from their phones.

But mobile payments is just one of the platforms MasterCard hopes developers will innovate on using its technology. The company says it has identified 20 other areas in which their APIs could be used, including payroll systems, social networking applications, eWallets, and online games. With the growing popularity of sites like Blippy, which allows users to automatically share their credit card purchases with their friends, MasterCard may be providing a valuable API to developers at a ripe moment for these kinds of platforms and services.

Many have been skeptical about these new services due to apparent security risks that come from mobile payment systems, but MasterCard is taking precautions to make sure their platform is not abused. According to its press release this morning, "all developers will be approved and registered by MasterCard to ensure that MasterCard payment and data services continue to be used appropriately and productively."

I was watching Nexus One very carefully especially it's direct to consumer implications considering my emphasis on the Open Gardens philosophy. By all accounts, the reception has been luke warm and as the fierce wireless article says, when it is available, Nexus one is not in its original incarnation (through a direct to consumer web site), rather it is sold and distributed through Operators - making it similar to any other phone

So .. What does it mean for the industry as a whole?

Nexus One put Google directly in competition (and indeed conflict) with other handset vendors who adopted Android. So, in that context, I see Nexus One as an experiment and in Google showing what is potentially possible. This is similar to Google strategy of acquiring spectrum Google: Spectrum bid goal was openness, not winning.

These goals are commendable but also commercial in keeping up with the Google business model of advertising(more people use more content and more that content is linked- annotated , the better the advertising model works as long as Google can capture meta data for that content). That philosophy applies to spectrum as it applies to phones .. Others benefit (and some lose) and the customer gets services which they could never dream of before(example Google maps and Google street view)

Whatever you can say about that vision, it certainly works .. And it customers like it ..
This last bit 'customers like it' probably explains the Nexus One status ..
In other words, I see it as an experiment which customers(as of today) did not get (and don't like as such) since they had nothing 'special' to look forward to

Remember that the Web players like Google , Facebook, Twitter and Apple are nothing without their customer fan base(a lesson telcos learnt only too late after the proverbial horse had well and truly bolted from the stable)

There are many factors already discussed such as 'support' by email only for Nexus one, iPhone comparison, not understanding the consumer device market and the experimentation angle ..

However, I would like to add two things to this:

a) Apple succeeded to some extent by the direct billing (through iTunes) which is a sort of direct to consumer strategy. That worked because they had the customer on their side by providing a truly superior product in the iPhone. To get concessions from Operators, we need a truly superior product - which Nexus One was not and nor were the many offerings from Nokia(which explains Nokia's current soul searching).

In other words, the customer is the main driver. If you want to get Operators to change their strategies, get the customer on your side first.. That did not happen with Nexus One.

b) The second point is more subtle. There needs to be ONE main factor for the switch. It's hard to convince customers about MANY benefits. One BIG benefit which MATTERS for customers will do. Most of us had hotmail accounts. Many of us(including me) switched to gmail in a big way. Why? It was more than 'Google'. For me, gmail has one BIG feature which literally gave me something very valuable .. TIME .. And that's the SPAM filter. Nothing else comes even close to it. That alone was enough to justify the move.

So, to conclude, I see Nexus one as an experiment .. But a valuable one in Openness where we can all learn the value of serving the customer.

In fact, HP's (NYSE: HPQ) 1.2 billion play for Palm is shaping up to be more about tablets than smartphones. The smartphone business, which is quickly becoming super saturated with the likes notebook makers such as Dell, Lenovo and Acer, is one both HP and Palm are separately struggling in. But as Technology Business Research points out, the tablet computing space hasn't been well defined by any single manufacturer or operating system. Could Palm's WebOS combined with HP's extensive PC manufacturing expertise give it the leading position?

The scuttlebutt this week has to do with whether HP will drop tablet plans to incorporate Windows 7 and go with the WebOS. IMS Research principal analyst Anna Hunt expects HP to employ WebOS in favor of Windows 7 OS, citing the high cost and potential strain on the processor.

Moreover, Palm's webOS, despite gaining little traction in the smartphone market, is liked by developers as it offers many similarities to Linux. The platform just didn't have the volume to woo developers en mass. "If HP can create a compelling tablet offering that people are willing to buy, the barriers to entry for developers might be fairly minimal," wrote IMS Research analyst Chris Schreck. Moreover, HP has a commanding presence in the enterprise market, which should be attractive to developers.

Jack Gold, founder and principal analyst with J Gold Associates, points out that since tablets are mainly front ends to the Internet, there is a big play for HP to deploy many cloud-based services from which it can generate revenue. I can only imagine the cloud-based services HP can dream up for the enterprise

Think enterprise people. This was first and foremost an enterprise move by HP. Consumers are fun and it's fun to write about and think about pretty things for them... but the big money is in the enterprise. The value add is for the enterprise.

Many people won't buy a 1.0 Apple product because they think Apple will either add new features or drop the price quickly. (Other people are just haters looking for excuses).

When making a large purchase like an iPad, it's important to be as informed as possible. Based on years of experience following Apple and their product line, here are my predictions for the future of the iPad:

• Apple will not make hardware changes to the iPad for one full year. iPods are updated every September. iPhones are updated every June. The iPad will be updated every April.
• The iPad will get free updates to fix bugs. So don't think buying 1.0 means you have a buggy product (all iPhones are fully upgradeable).
• The cheapest iPad is $499. This will not change. Apple might add more storage and features in future revisions, but $499 will be the low point for a while. 
• The high end iPad models are where Apple makes most of its money. The 3G and memory chips cost less than $10. So these are also the models that might drop in price the most.
• There are way too many iPad models right now. This is very unlike Apple and I believe they will consolidate once they figure out which models people are buying. 
• Given all this, I predict that later this year the iPad product line will be something like:

1. $499, 16GB WiFi
2. $599, 32GB 3G
3. $699, 64GB, 3G

Bottom line: If you are on the fence about buying a 1.0 iPad, go with the cheapest model.

I don't think there will be a hardware revision this year, and I don't think there will be a price drop on the $499 iPad. Whether you are buying a computer, car, or iPad, you get the most value out of the base model, and options have diminishing returns.

Being an early adopter can be super expensive if done poorly. But it is a manageable addiction. Buy the low end model, and be sure to sell it when you upgrade.

I found it valuable so I am sharing.

Mobile Strategy Done Right

Many Coca-Cola Enterprises employees are on the road engaging with customers every day, so the company developed an enterprise strategy for mobilizing business apps, instead of doing them as one-off projects. The strategy's first tenet is device independence, developing an app once that'll run on different devices, such as Windows Mobile and BlackBerry. Second, the goal is to be real time, using connectivity to monitor and react to events in the field. Lastly, the strategy is source system independent, leveraging SOA to tap multiple systems for a transaction and letting Coca-Cola Enterprises turn legacy systems into mobilized platforms.