Tag Archives: technology

Apple ne vend plus de produits…

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Pour tous ceux qui pensent encore qu’Apple vend des produits (iPhone 6) et ne comprennent pas leur approche "Ecosystème"…

Une très bonne analyse qui nous change des discussions sur la nouvelle "taille de l’écran"

Apple ne vend plus de produits

Pour chaque euro généré par la vente d’un iPhone, combien d’euros sont générés par les musiciens, développeurs, fabricants d’accessoires ou acteurs industriels ? Car même si Apple ne se rémunère que peu sur ce chiffre global (ce n’est pas leur objectif direct), le stabilité générée autour de chacun de leurs produits est proprement phénoménale. Chaque produit Apple est une comète avec une queue de plusieurs km de long, qui donne une assise incomparable sur le marché. Une assise qui stabilise Apple bien au-delà ce qu’un Microsoft ou un Samsung pourrait rêver avoir un jour.

Dropbox in Forbes

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via Forbes.com

As a happy customer (50GB plan) of Dropbox since years now, I was very interested by this article in Forbes. Some insights (even if I encourage you to read the full article):

  • Dropbox has today 50 million users, one new user per second joining
  • 96% of the users pay nothing
  • 325 million files saved per day
  • Steve Jobs/Apple wanted to acquire Dropbox in 2009 for a nine-digit price
  • 2008: 9 employees. 200k customers
  • 2010: 14 employees, 2 million customers
  • Revenue 2011: $240 million, already profitable, 70 employees
  • Revenue 2012: even if they would not sign one single new customer, their sales will double
  • Dropbox started with $15k from Y Combinator
  • 1st VC round from Sequoia of $1.2 million
  • VC round in 2008, $7.2 million raised
  • VC round in August 2011, $250 million raised with a valuation of around $4 billion, VCs participating: Index Ventures (lead), Sequoia, Greylock, Benchmark, Accel, Goldman Sachs and RIT Capital Partners
  • Competitors perceived: Apple iCloud, Google Drive

Impressive story, wow…

Mobile Trends 2011

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via ReadWriteMobile

ReadWriteMobile is publishing an interesting post about the coming and emerging 10 Mobile Trends for 2011 based on a Forrester Research study. Some of them seem to be relevant also for us at Innoveo:

2) 2011 is the Year of the “Dumb” Smartphone User

Smartphones will become more affordable, thanks to handset subsidies. And these new users will be less engaged and active than smartphone early adopters. Forrester expects they’ll download fewer apps on average, but will consume more mobile media thanks to consumer education and convenience provided by the phones.

Despite the fact that these former “dumb phone” users may download fewer apps than early adopters, the overall app forecast is still good. In fact, Gartner also just released a report that stated mobile app store revenue will pass $15 billion in 2011.

3) The Mobile Fragmentation Problem will Continue

Forrester says it expects fragmentation to continue, but it’s not just referring to the multiple variations of a single OS. It means that some customers have smartphones, some have feature phones, some use apps, some use SMS, plus there are multiple OS’s in existence, in multiple versions, with multiple screen sizes and there are a higher number of devices out there. In short: fragmentation. The costs of porting, maintaining and promoting apps will remain high.

4) The “Apps vs. Internet” Debate Will Continue…to be Irrelevant

Says Forrester, it’s not a question of “either/or” when it comes to a choice between apps vs. the mobile Web, but both. Frequent and intense users of services like banking and brokerage will want curated experiences in the form of apps, but the Internet will remain the fallback for more occasional information and needs.

8) Companies will Invest First in Convenient Services for Consumers

Forrester says that mobile product and service professionals, particularly in the travel industry, will invest first to keep their most lucrative customers happy. And in the hierarchy of benefits that mobile offers – revenue generation, cost savings and convenience – convenience will reign during 2011.

10) “Mobile” Will Mean More than Mobile Phones

Consumer adoption of tablets, eReaders, portable media devices and other mobile products has grown in 2010 and this will continue in 2011. Apps and services will need to work across devices and consumers will want ubiquitous access to content and services.  This will force service providers to sync content via the cloud to maintain a consistent experience across platforms.

cross-posted on the Innoveo Blog

Insurance Distribution challenges

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via Celent

Michel Michellod from Celent, an international strategy consultancy focused on the financial industry, has just posted a very interesting article which is very “aligned” with how we understand ourselves the current and coming insurance front-end challenges.

Some interesting strategic challenges highlighted in the post:

The direct channel requires an appropriate front end. […] This goal can be best achieved through the implementation of open and flexible front end systems facilitating interactions with potential customers, integrating modern communication tools for call center officers and allowing a high level of reactivity in terms of product, pricing and discount changes.

Communication with aggregators is key. […]  The second alternative consists in directing shoppers automatically onto the insurance online platform to perform the last step of the buying process (the effective purchase of the insurance product and its payment). This alternative requires an instantaneous transmission of customer and quote data by aggregators to insurers.

Insurers need to improve integration of affinity and bank channels. […] Insurers need to implement relevant portals allowing management and process of sophisticated insurance products.

Use brokers and agents in specific customer segments. […] I recommend insurers to implement sophisticated portals with rich functionality to provide point of differentiation.

Responding to multi-channel management. […] I believe insurers should prioritize sophisticated portals providing a single view of the customer based on service oriented architecture (SOA) with high level of automation.

As the insurance distribution landscape is changing fast and drastically, I expect this topic to be part of the European insurer’s top priorities in the coming years.

At Innoveo, we are exactly acting in this field and bringing a standard software product on the market – Innoveo Skye®– which allows insurance companies (life, non-life, health) to find an efficient, technology-proven and business-oriented answer to the different challenges raised by Celent.

Disclaimer: we were nominated by Celent as “Model Carrier” in 2007 for our effective usage of technology. See the report here.

Cross-posted on the Innoveo Blog