Blog articles from 11/2013

Samsung Electronics recently announced that its Galaxy Gear has become the world's most popular smartwatch with 800,000 sales since its debut in September. Leading up to the Gear's release, the smartwatch was promoted through advertisements and collaborations with fashion shows to seize leadership in the wearable computer market. Sales are higher than what Samsung expected and is panning to expand sales promotions for the device for the year-end holiday sales. This...

Earlier this year, Digitalsmiths and zeebox worked together and launched Digitalsmiths Seamless Discovery, a personalized video discovery service across all of zeebox’s supported platforms, in the United States. Now, building off its success, the two companies are bringing the service to the United Kingdom and Australia. Digitalsmiths Seamless Discovery  enables zeebox users to experience the "Recommended For You" feature that delivers personalized...

Parks Associates has released a new primary research survey, 360 View: Energy & American Broadband Households . This consumer survey highlights value propositions driving adoption of smart home products and services and the role of energy within this expanding market area. This research study reveals the consumer perspective with the expanding smart home market. It also provides analysis and in-depth details of the rapidly changing landscape of energy management and smart...

Two major events occurred in September 2013 affecting the mobile payments ecosystem-Google's expansion of its Wallet app to non-NFC smartphone users and Apple's reveal of the iPhones 5S and 5C. Both of these events appeared to move the vision of a mobile payments future based on NFC (near field communication) further from reality. However, when examined more closely, these moves align with each company's near-term strategies, while NFC still has several key advantages that will keep...

Parks Associates has relesased a new market focus, Support Services for Mobile Devices . This research analyzes the market for technical support services for smartphones and tablets. It begins by exploring and number and types of problems consumers experience and how they resolve these problems. Next it analyzes subscription support services including current and previous adopters as well as the demand for such services. Finally, it gauges the use of support apps and their role in...