Mobile Groove

In brief: Europe’s first-ever Augmented Reality (AR) business conference is the perfect jumping-of point for a look at Dutch Augmented Reality (AR) company Layar, an interview with Maarten Lens-FitzGerald, Layar Co-founder & VP of Distribution and Marketing, and some updated company news & stats.

The overwhelming positive response to Europe’s first-ever Augmented Reality Business Conference and Developer Camp (ARBCon) speaks volumes about the new direction and vast potential of AR. The event – which was organized by my esteemed colleague Dan Romescu, an AR pioneer, to bring together companies across the emerging business ecosystem including developers, VCs and researchers. It attracted over 155 participants and featured over 30 speakers/keynotes from 17 countries.

MOBILE SEARCH WILL TAKE UP ALMOST 75 PERCENT OF THE MOBILE AD MARKET BY 2013, according to a recent report from Citibank. The report says that SMS ads currently represent 63 percent of mobile ad spending, but this will drop to 9 percent in four years; display ads are projected to increase 5 points to 18 percent. The report says mobile search currently makes up about a quarter of the mobile ad market.

Overall, the mobile ad market is projected to rise from $160 million to $3.1 billion by 2013. Source

ARPU FIGURES DON’T GIVE AN ACCURATE PICTURE OF INDIVIDUAL SPENDING, says a new report from Wireless Intelligence, because of the proliferation of multiple connections per user. For instance, in North America, the reported penetration rate is 92 percent, but when you take out multiple connections with the same user, the real rate is just 71 percent. Consequently, spending per user is $64 per month, rather than the reported $51. In Western Europe, the per user figure is €33 per month, while the per connection rate is €23. Source

The bottom line: The ARPU metric has been under fire for some time, not least because it only looks at revenues, and says nothing about profitability. Consumers having multiple connections is a trend that will proliferate, as more users get 3G dongles, e-book readers and other types of connected devices. This trend could accelerate the move towards another key metric in the industry.

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MOBILE MAPPING GROWING, BUT PC SITES STILL RULE, according to ABI Research. The firm says that internet mapping sites will get 440 million monthly visitors next year. ABI has also noted that while big names like Google, Mapquest, Sohu and Baidu currently dominate the mapping space, more and more players, such as navigation vendors like TomTom and NAVTEQ, and even mobile companies like Nokia, are launching their own navigation sites. Source

The bottom line: Expect mobile use to fuel the next stage of growth in mapping services, as more and more devices get GPS functionality, making maps so much easier to use, and mobile mapping applications improve. PC mapping isn’t going anywhere, but mapping on the mobile makes much more sense in many scenarios. This calls into question the need for standalone GPS units – which is why GPS vendors are pushing hard into the mobile space.