Loading ...Are we ready for tomorrow’s user?
At Accenture’s Global Convergence Forum last month, the consulting company discussed how the high-tech, communications and telecommunications (HCT) industries are in for a 10x growth opportunity in light of an increasingly converging world.
Accenture said it expects the traditionally linear user experience equation will be complicated by new factors in this new converged world: new spaces, faces and places.
Not surprisingly, there will be the digital age user – born between 1978-2006 – who perceives IT as a natural component of their lives. But less obviously, citizens will play a role as they increasingly look to IT for work and recreation. Also, the middle-class will emerge alongside a diminished affluent market. And, markets like China and India will emerge.
But this predicted 10x growth can only be reaped by those businesses that know how to harness that opportunity. In particular, they first need to acknowledge that a converging world creates a new kind of user, and with that user comes a new set of expectations, and even challenges like diminished loyalty.
In theory, that sounds straightforward enough: acknowledge user needs and tailor products and services for those specific needs. But even today, before the linear equation has yet to become overly-complex, user expectations aren’t always met. The mobile market, for instance, often churns out gimmicky gadgets with cool functionality that satiates the hunger of the early adopter and technology enthusiast. But the early adopter and enthusiast form but a niche market. Yet handheld devices are a ubiquitous technology, and the average user is often sidelined by the vendor in an effort to go to market with cool products. Even today’s mobile developers admit the average user is an untapped market yearning for practical functionality for every day use.
If we can’t meet the more basic expectations of the average user in a pre-converged world, harnessing that golden growth opportunity that tomorrow’s world of new markets and new users promises may be trickier than we think. Perhaps figuring out how to conquer existing markets is a good way to prime oneself for a new world of complex emerging markets.
Posted on April 18th, 2008 by Kathleen Lau and filed under Future Technology | No Comments »Add to: del.icio.us | Digg IT | Furl | Google | magnolia | StumbleIT | Wink | Yahoo! Technorati
Loading ...Your predictions for 2008
We’ve had our say … now it’s your turn. What will turn the tech industry on its head in 2008? Who’s buying whom? What’s hot and what’s hype? Share your predictions for the coming year in the comment roll below.
Posted on January 24th, 2008 by Dave Webb and filed under Future Technology | No Comments »Add to: del.icio.us | Digg IT | Furl | Google | magnolia | StumbleIT | Wink | Yahoo! Technorati
Loading ...Google’s spectrum play
So Google will be a player in the upcoming 700 MHz U.S. wireless spectrum auction after all. Speculation’s been rife, but speculating’s easy, since Google guaranteed the Federal Communications Commission it’ll bid a minimum of $4.6 billion for a block of spectrum back in the summer.
The company has since announced a mobile development platform, Android, which wasn’t the branded mobile phone watchers were anticipating with bated breath, but still made you wonder: What are these people up to? Read the rest of this entry »
Posted on December 3rd, 2007 by Dave Webb and filed under Future Technology, Web 2.0, cell, mobile, wireless | No Comments »Add to: del.icio.us | Digg IT | Furl | Google | magnolia | StumbleIT | Wink | Yahoo! Technorati
Loading ...Floored by a coffee table
Having gone to roughly a million technology demonstrations in the last 10 years, I’m a skeptic. I’m rarely thrilled by a demo. Especially one on a Saturday when I have my nine-year-old’s exquisite company. So I blew off an invite for a Saturday show by Microsoft without a second thought.
As it happened, my daughter and I accidentally wandered into the Microsoft Surface demonstration at the Sheraton in downtown Toronto Saturday afternoon. I was not impressed by the technology. I was completely floored. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted on September 17th, 2007 by Dave Webb and filed under Future Technology | 1 Comment »