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Innovation leaders: A Q&A with Loic Le Meur (Seesmic CEO)
The tech industry is driven by innovation. It’s the beating pulse that propels the development of new solutions, new platforms and new ways of thinking. After many years in the tech industry, I still wake up each morning excited by the prospect of new ideas and opportunities that may change our society and the way we experience the world.
One of the people at the centre of this tech innovation is Loic Le Meur, CEO of Seesmic and founder of LeWeb. I recently had a chance to catch up with Loic and ask him a few questions on innovation and its impact on today’s networks.
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Did the mobile tidal wave just become a tsunami?
For any regular readers of this blog, it will come as no surprise that I was fascinated this week by the release of Cisco’s latest Visual Networking Index (VNI) study and its explosive findings on the growth of mobile broadband. So explosive in fact, that the sheer volume of news that it generated was almost as steep as the study’s predictions for the world’s appetite for mobile data.
One article in particular caught my attention, referring to Cisco’s findings as a looming tsunami for the mobile industry. On face value this appears to be a fair assessment. Between 2010 and 2015, Cisco expects to see a 92% compound annual growth rate in the amount of mobile data traffic. This growth represents a 26-fold increase, with the average mobile user consuming 1,118 Mbit/s of data. Today’s average user consumes 65 Mbit/s.
Mobile bandwidth crunch: fact or fiction?
One of the fascinating aspects of working in the tech sector is the continuous ream of facts and figures on the state of the world’s networks. Barely a week passes without a new set of data being published that usually signals the end of the modern world, or at the very least the collapse of the network as we know it. Earlier this month, however, I read a report on mobile broadband suggesting that things may not be as bad as we think.
Published by Analysis Mason, the report discusses the growth of mobile data and states that we’re far from seeing the much vaunted data explosion. In fact, their figures state that Europe’s mobile data is growing at around 35% and is set to slow in 2011. This is quite a contrast to research I received from telecom analyst Dimitris Mavrakis. According to figures he received from Vodafone, mobile data is growing at 88% year-on-year.
Could video kill the mobile web?
Video’s record for causing disruption and widespread panic in the technology and media industry is nothing new. In the 1980s, video was accused of killing the radio star (escaped jail on a technicality). In the 1990s, it was implicated in bringing down cinema (thrown out of court). Yet in 2010, video faces its toughest allegation yet: killing the mobile web.
Although this may appear a bold statement, the concern over video’s impact on mobile broadband is starting to take hold and is supported by a wealth of new research that highlights the dramatic growth in mobile data, driven by continued strong sales of smartphones and tablets. Recent figures from the Office of National Statistics reveal that there’s been a 20-fold increase in mobile data in the past year, with over 31% of Internet users now connecting to the web via a mobile device. These figures will only increase as more tablets enter the marketplace and video-centric applications move from WiFi to cellular networks. In a recent post, I discussed the challenges posed by Skype and FaceTime as they prepare for mobile mass adoption.
Mobile broadband: Why don’t you call anymore?
On a recent train journey to London, I found myself shoe-horned into a fully booked quiet coach. When I pulled out my usual travelling companions – iPhone and Blackberry – I thought I would be greeted by looks of disdain or at the very least some ssshhhing. However, this wasn’t the case and when I looked around I began to see why. The carriage was full of people with laptops and 3G dongles, iPads and some with the Holy Trinity of smartphones: iPhone, Android and Blackberry. All around people were engaged in a flurry of emails, tweets, status updates, location check-ins and other app-based activities.
Although I spend a great deal of my time discussing the development of mobile broadband and its impact on the world’s networks, it’s very rare that I see such a concentrated example of the service in use. This thought was brought to the front of my mind today when I saw this infographic (see left). This graphic highlights the geosocial universe and most critically the proportion of each platform accessed via a mobile device. Even a cursory glance at this information shows the impact mobile broadband is having on the way we communicate and access services. This is particularly true when we consider that nearly half of Facebook’s 500 million users access the site through a mobile device. This means mobile gaming, mobile uploads of images and videos, mobile messaging and one can anticipate that in the near future that Facebook may also develop some form of video conferencing service.
Although the move towards mobile connectivity is nothing new and is critical in the move to rollout connectivity in both developed and developing nations the figures continue to impress. This is underlined in Ofcom’s recent Communication’s Market report that reveals a 240% increase in the UK’s mobile data volumes in 2009 when compared to 2007. The report goes on to note that in 2009, 13.5 million people surfed the web via their phones. A figure that has almost tripled since 2008.
Aside from the impact on the networking infrastructure to support this dramatic increase in mobile data, it’s also important to consider the cultural significance of this. In the mobile universe, the demand for data is increasing at the same pace as the demand for voice is decreasing. Om Malik highlighted this trend in a recent Gigaom article, where he discussed the move from voice to data and how we no longer talk anymore.
I can certainly see this trend with myself. How many times do I tweet someone as opposed to calling them? The answer is higher than I care to imagine.
However, I’m hoping that soon this trend will come full circle. In an earlier blog post, I discussed if video would soon become the new voice. Gigaom seem to believe so and are predicting 30 billion video calls by 2015. The iPhone 4 and the rollout of true mobile VoIP solutions are enabling this development. The big question is what the impact will be on the cellular networks when VoIP services move from WiFi connections.
There is one important side-effect of mass mobile video conferencing that I need to consider though and that’s what will my neighbours on the quiet coach say when I pull out the latest iPhone for a video conference with my extended family.
How has the mobile changed your life and communication patterns? Do you talk less and tweet more?
Read more on the challenges of mobile backhaul here.
