Blog articles from 07/2012

Written by: Jennifer Kent, Research Analyst, Parks Associates I had the pleasure of attending the 4 th Annual mHealth World Congress in Boston last week, and spoke on a panel of analysts concerning consumer uptake of mHealth applications and solutions. With the Supreme Court giving the Affordable Care Act the all-clear, companies in this area are forging ahead with new initiatives to increase the quality of care while cutting costs; many of these initiatives leverage mobile...

Roaming occurs when a wireless client device moves outside the usable range of one wireless access point and connects to another AP. There is no “roaming” issue as far as the AP is concerned. As long as the APs are setup properly, client devices can roam seamlessly from one AP to another. The issue and challenge comes in the actual “handoff ” process, which, according to the IEEE 802.11 standard [1], is dictated by the client device. The handoff is the process of the client device...

Zynga 's stocks are taking a beating since releasing its earnings a couple of days ago. Facebook shares plunged to new lows today. Do these events mean that more trouble is on the way for the social gaming industry? We are still optimistic about the long-term evolution of the industry: - Facebook's growth may have slowed down but the social network is now close to 1 billion monthly active users (up 29% year over year). - New consumer segments continue to be attracted to social...

Written by Patrice Samuels, Research Analyst BskyB launched its new service “Now TV” last week and is now positioned to provide virtual MSO services in the U.K. The new service consists of a “Sky Movies Pass” offering that gives users access to 600 films and 11 channels for £15 and a "pay & play" option that allows access to 1000 single movie titles for 99p - £3.49 per film. The service is currently available on PCs, Macs and selected Android smartphones; it...

CONNECTIONS™ Industry Insights Newsletter is a complimentary newsletter compiling the latest developments in the connected home, including event announcements for the CONNECTIONS™ Conference services, research information from Parks Associates analysts, and information about out sponsors.  July's issue highlights: Telefónica, Orange, and Swisscom speak at CONNECTIONS™ Europe: Monetizing the Digital Home Parks Associates Announces 7th Annual CONNECTIONS™...

Europe had over 155 million broadband households at the end of 2011, representing over 30% of broadband households worldwide. Service providers throughout Europe are looking to add value to broadband services in order to increase revenues and extend their subscriber relationships. Top options include video, home management, and tech support services, but finding the correct service combinations and attracting consumers have been challenges. For example, usage and awareness of TV...

TiVo Inc. , a leader in the advanced television entertainment market, recently announced that it will acquire TRA, Inc., creator of the leading platform with the world's largest database that directly links information from the same households as to what viewers watch with what they buy. TRA matches television exposures from 1.5 million TV homes with specific purchase transactions. TiVo’s acquisition will create a unique combination of insights that will offer the TV advertising...

The connected home phenomenon - where products and services are linked together to share computing resources and information - is reshaping the competitive landscape among service providers, retailers, and consumer electronics companies. The lines that defined and separated the different roles for each consumer product have blurred. No longer does a service provider remain the sole provider of communications or entertainment services. A retailer or OEM may have been the primary...