How the FLAG network was made
Excellent old feature from Wired: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html
Found via: Quora
Read MoreBritney Spears And Venture Capital
In my younger, considerably more rebellious days I used to be one of those really irritating people who could appreciate only one kind of music. At that time I was passionate about all forms of heavy metal, and later, the alternative/indie rock scene. As a connoisseur of a niche genre, it would bug me to no end that artists like Britney Spears (or name any other global pop sensation) get so much of fame and money while the kind of artists that I liked always seemed to struggle.
As I grew older and started having a bit more of a clue as to how the music industry worked, it became obvious to me that if it was not for the success of the many pop sensations and manufactured global stars, a large chunk of the smaller, niche artists would never have been allowed the luxury to record and be heard by a lot of people like me. The way venture capital works is in a similar manner. They need at least a couple of multi-platinum runaway hits on their hands to be able to afford to take their chances on smaller higher risk ventures.
For a product person, it is irksome to see some of the ideas/concepts that get funded. It makes no sense and it looks stupidly driven by hype. Oftentimes, the purist product person is the niche indie artist and can’t see anything beyond the purity of what she/he is doing. But the fact is that there is no single route to success. Some of the routes are fair, some are more unfair. Some who wind up being funded and (or) successful may not even deserve it. But every bit of success collectively adds up to open the doors for a few more outliers.
Read MoreLooking Back At 2011
This year easily qualifies as one of the toughest I have had after 2007. Almost everything that was planned and attempted for this year has either not worked out or not done well at all. The good part is that I have learned much, the bad part is that the entire year is almost a complete write off. It is back to the drawing board for 2012. Meanwhile, here’s wishing everyone a wonderful 2012.
Read MoreWhat Is A Good Mobile Strategy For India?
As the previous post focused on an overview of the scenario for banking applications for Indian banks on Android, I thought it would be a good idea to have a follow-up post on what is a good mobile strategy for your products. Products built also for Mobile Internet in India goes back a very long way. Rediff had a mobile website in 2000 which was marked up in WML. Those days, more than a mobile phone it was a PDA that was the target device and it was a requirement from a product hygiene that led the well-funded companies down that path.
By 2005 the focus had changed drastically from building WAP-enabled websites to leveraging the SMS-based revenue streams. A lot of money and effort was spent on getting ‘on-deck’ with the operators, which was followed by the era of the short-code. Then came the age of the backend service providers such as July Systems who would transform your data into a mobile-friendly format and handle the presentation of it as a managed service. And now we find ourselves in the app era where content and service apps targetting iOS and Android (Blackberry, Symbian and WP being after thoughts) are being released by companies on a regular basis.
For decision makers in the industry this is a very confusing time since there are multiple strategies that could be deployed:
- Only web: Ignore mobile and all facets of it due to cost and operational complexities. There are zero cost workarounds possible if you are on WordPress by using plugins that will accomplish this for you. On custom platforms you can use a mobile-friendly template and hope that it renders decently across most devices, or at least devices that are less than 4-5 years old.
- Web + SMS: Considering the mess created by TRAI regarding bulk messaging, this is still an evolving scenario, but it is feasible to have an SMS-based operation with a managed service longer short code for a reasonable amount of money.
- Web + SMS + Mobile web: This is (2) augmented with a dedicated mobile website, or a main website that detects a mobile device and serves the right format for pages.
- Web + SMS + Mobile Web + app: This is (3) augmented with apps that are built for various mobile platforms.
- Web + Mobile Web + app: This is a strategy that seems to be picking up a lot these days, with a variant of Web + app.
There is no hard and fast rule that will help you decide which is the best route to pick. There are significant cost and operational complexities that are involved in adding a new target platform. Even with a managed, outsourced service the support needs to be provided to supply the right data, which is just one part of the entire integration puzzle.
Key Metrics:
- Cost: Of deployment, maintenance and growth.
- Audience: Size, geography, demographic.
- Platform: Size, geography, demographic.
- Monetization: Ads, subscriptions (current and projected)
Most operations don’t have a good handle on the four key metrics before they jump into the mobile rabbit hole. Of the available strategies (4) is the most expensive and worst in terms of integration issues. Even though apps are the in-thing to do, the costs for development of an application is quite high and in India you have to support the application on at least three platforms to reach out to a demographic who can be monetized a bit better. The NDTV application in Android Market has about half a million as an install base, but most of that came as a result of the app being featured in the marketplace and installs have fallen off a cliff ever since.
A good rule of thumb to use is to not go with apps for content-only websites, unless you can either support a significantly different/superior user experience or if you have content that is accessible only under a subscription. Non-aggregated content apps always stand the risk of being crowded on in the app screens and eventually decay without repeat usage. It is better to stick to having a mobile-friendly website in this case and only switch to an app if you see the demand for it or you have services that work well with an application. You also have to take into consideration that bandwidth is an issue here, even when it is available over 3G.
Service-oriented businesses are better off with a focus on applications primarily because monetization is already built into most online services. For instance, should a Flipkart decide to eventually support e-books, a fully functional (better than the wrapper around the mobile website approach they currently have) application will allow them to ease into that segment. Same is the case with ticketing services. These businesses also have a greater opportunity in providing unique user experiences around their services compared to content-only players.
For smaller shops, mobile applications are best left alone at the moment. There is simply not enough size/support in the market to justify the cost and effort. It is much easier to clean up the mark-up and have a website that presents a reasonably degraded and functional website to mobile browsers.
Read MoreQuick Look At Official Indian Banking Apps On Android
The main list of banks to track has been sourced from the BANK-NIFTY and it throws up an interesting set of results
Axis Bank Ltd.
No official Android app, supported in NGpay. There is a Java mobile app for it.
Bank of Baroda
Official App: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.fss.bob
Install base: 1,000 – 5,000
Bank of India
No official Android app. There is a Java mobile app for it.
Canara Bank
No official Android app. There is a Java mobile app for it.
HDFC Bank Ltd.
No official Android app, supported in NGpay. There is a Java mobile app for it.
ICICI Bank Ltd.
Official App: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.csam.icici.bank.imobile
Install Base: 100,000 – 500,000
IDBI Bank Ltd.
No official Android app. There is a Java mobile app for it.
IndusInd Bank Ltd.
Official App: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.fss.indus
Install Base: 100 – 500
Kotak Mahindra Bank Ltd.
No official Android app. There is a Java mobile app for it.
Punjab National Bank
No official Android app. There is a Java mobile app for it.
State Bank of India
Official App: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.sgs.sbi.mbanking
Install Base: 50,000 – 100,000
Union Bank of India (FSS)
Official App: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.fss.ubi
Install Base: NA
Other Notables:
Citibank India:
Official App: https://market.android.com/details?id=com.citiuat
Install Base: 10,000 – 50,000
Stanchart India
Official App: https://market.android.com/details?id=air.app.scb.breeze.android.main.in.prod
Install Base: 1000-5000
Notes:
- Interestingly, only five of the twelve banks from the list have official applications on the Android platform.
- Pretty much every bank on that list has a J2ME app for mobile banking, which makes a lot of sense in a country like ours.
- Even the banks with Android apps don’t feature it prominently on their websites.
- Only exception to (3) is ICICI Bank, who are a bit overenthusiastic in promoting iMobile.
- HDFC Bank is a notable absentee in the list, even though they are supported through NGpay.
- The apps mostly have the same feature set. Understandable, as the backend service providers tend to be the same few across banks, which makes feature-based differentiation a hard one to pull off.
- Citibank India and Stanchart India have a reasonable install base.
- nGpay supports both Axis Bank and HDFC, which should be the cheapest route for banks to integrate with an Android or mobile app.
- FSS powers the services of Bank of Baroda and Union Bank of India. Looks like they are using a white-label application.
- SBI’s install numbers are a pleasant surprise. Shows a level of awareness in the market I had, honestly, not expected.
- Quite revealing that both SBI and the FSS-based apps have a minimum requirement of Android 1.5 and up, while most of the others are 2.x.
- These numbers can be quite misleading. It is nearly impossible to track the install base of the J2ME apps. So, usage could be a different matter altogether.
- Install base leader board
- ICICI Bank
- SBI
- NGpay
- Citibank India
- Bank of Baroda
- Stanchart India
- Indusind Bank