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The top mobile stories from the past 24 hours, served with cream and two sugars.

 

Tim Cook responds to claims of factory worker mistreatment: ‘We care about every worker in our supply chain’ (via 9to5mac)
After reading this article, make sure to also read this New York Times piece.

Apple Overtakes Samsung As World’s Largest Smartphone Vendor In Q4 (via TechCrunch)
Apple achieved 23.9% market share during Q4 2011, narrowly beating out Samsung’s 23.5% share.

What Happens When Apps Go On Sale?: Revenue Up 22% On iPhone, 29% On Android (via TechCrunch)
To examine what happens when apps go on sale, Distimo examined the 100 top grossing apps in the iPhone App Atore, iPad App Store and Android Market.

I’ve come to terms with the fact that there are really only 2 companies vying for mobile supremacy and they are Apple and Google. If you take a look at their collective 2011 it is obvious the rest of the “players” aren’t even in the game at this point.

Who will challenge these guys? Is this really only a 2-company showdown? I hope not!

Welcome to our newest show – m-pulse – the show that explores the most important stories in mobile over the past week, brings you in depth interviews with the minds shaping the mobile industry and highlights some of the companies or products that have moved the industry forward.

This week we sit with Kevin C Tofel, purveyor of all things mobile at GigaOm, to talk about his 16 2012 mobile predictions, Peggy jumps into some surprising consumer behaviour desires (i.e. to not be stalked by brands) and Rob tries to make sense of the mess that has become RIM after the CEO shakeup.

As part of an ongoing dialogue between mobile experts and proof that mobile will have an incredible impact on nearly every single business on the planet we venture into the restaurant industry today.

This is a tough industry to succeed in let alone sell into – even harder if it is something the restaurant can’t sell on their menu – like technology. Most of the technology in restaurants has been to speed up process thereby reducing costs – until mobile.

ORDR.in turns any website or app into a food ordering, money making machine with mobile being the breakthrough technology tool for this industry – according to CEO David Bloom.

If you are wondering how mobile can touch, help, deepen, engage and grow revenue in the restaurant space this is the episode for you. David touches on many aspects of mobile’s current and coming influence and ways that the devices we carry are going to fundamentally alter the way they do business.

Enjoy!

The top mobile stories from the past 24 hours, served with cream and two sugars.

 

iPhone accounts for more than 80 percent of AT&T smartphone sales (via GigaOM)
That’s approximately 7.6 million iPhones sold by AT&T in one quarter.

Microsoft’s Windows Phone dowry to net Nokia billions (via BGR)
In exchange for royalty payments estimated to reach into the billions over the life of the agreement, Microsoft makes quarterly “platform support payments” of $250 million to Nokia according to the vendor’s earnings report.

Android May Have Consumer Market Share, But iOS Is Tops In Enterprise (via TechCrunch)
According to a new report from managed enterprise mobility provider Good Technology, iOS devices hold the top three spots in the list of the top 10 enterprise activations by device type.

UNTETHER.tv was the official North American media partner for the recent MEFAmericas conference in Miami, FL. While we were there we had the great privilege of sitting down to discuss mobile with some of the most influential and forward thinking minds in the industry and we took full advantage.

In this clip we dive into some of the challenges and opportunities, impediments and freedoms that we are all struggling and embracing when it comes to mobile commerce and mobile transactions. Who’s going to lead, who will falter, how does this start and when do consumers start to adopt what is being built. We all want to know these answers so we asked Todd Daubert (Partner, SNR Denton), Neil Stiles (President of Variety Group) and Johanne Huber-Gutierrez (Mobile Strategy & Product Development, Macy’s & Bloomingdales) to offer their thoughts.

This is their collective response.

Enjoy!

The top mobile stories from the past 24 hours, served with cream and two sugars.

 

Apple Reports First Quarter Results (via Apple)
37 million iPhones sold, 15 million iPads sold, 46 billion in revenue and 13 billion in profit. Wow.

Apple’s Massive Numbers And Some Context (via TechCrunch)
A company this big is not supposed to be able to nearly double revenue year-to-year. Nor are they supposed to more than double profit. But Apple did both.

Apple CEO Tim Cook Touches On Kindle Fire, Android, Windows Phone (via Fast Company)
Cook rejected the comparison of iOS versus Android as a two-horse race, arguing that with over 315 million iOS devices cumulatively sold, Apple is far ahead of any competition.

6 Things Apple Can Do With Its Cash Hoard (via PC Mag)
How Apple could invest its cash and still stick to its own way of doing things.

Apple’s latest quater shows STAGGERING growth in iPhone sales – over 37 million of them to be close to exact. They also sold 315 million iOS units in 2011, managed to collect 50% of all Verizon smartphone sales and collect a whole lot of ex-Android, BlackBerry and WebOS owners.

Not too shabby at all.

How does mobile change the way we connect and stay in contact with people? The paradigm of the “contact manager” or “personal information system” is being changed by the context and connectedness of mobile devices and one company is reinventing this information layer that ties us all together.

The company is Xobni (something I’ve been using since they were in beta many years ago), the product is Smartr Contacts (JUST released for iPhone) and the expert is Michael Albers – VP of Product Development and the man whose task it was to get this latest release into the AppStore.

Michael details the process they went through to re-imagine contacts in a mobile context, the impact of the cloud on their business, the trials and triumphs of developing an app that extends an existing brand and how they remained constant and true to the other platforms already deployed and in use.

This is an episode I truly enjoyed – mostly because I use the product and have watched them grow from their first product for Outlook. Michael doesn’t hold back on the experience of ideation, creation and deploying a mobile app.

Enjoy!

The top mobile stories from the past 24 hours, served with cream and two sugars.

 

How Words With Friends Beat Scrabble At Its Own Game (via Fast Company)
The creators of the social Scrabble-like smartphone and tablet game offer insight into their reinvention of board game night.

What would 1M Windows Phones sold mean for Micro-kia? (via GigaOM)
Is it a morale boost or the start of a positive trend?

Yo, RIM: Where’s your sense of urgency? (via GigaOM)
Is RIM’s problem a lack of execution or a lack of fire?

Brace yourselves folks, Verizon has made its LTE strategy clear, and it’s designed to leave AT&T standing in the dust. Focused on becoming the leading US telecommunications provider, Verizon is positioned to gain both market share and ARPU (average revenue per unit) with its demand that LTE be in all future smatphones and tablets they sell.

While Verizon is winning the LTE race for network coverage, with service in 195 markets reaching 200 million people, their new LTE-only policy is certainly bold, as reports suggest that only 5% of devices shipping in 2012 will be LTE capable. So why such a strong play? Because Verizon has learned a lesson that started with the iPhone and will likely end with the iPad.

Welcome to This Week in Location Based Marketing where we rehash the news that matters in the location based marketing world.

Following The Big Show on the future of retail in New York City we focus on some timely stories from some of the companies that made a splash at the conference. From cloud analytics company NearBuy to geofencing service LocalPoint launched by Digby to Foursquare getting into the menu business and the smartest glasses we’ve ever since. Plus a clip from Urbain Airship’s CEO Scott Kveton.

Episode 61

Recorded: January 22, 2012
Hosts: Rob Woodbridge & Asif Khan

Show highlights:
1. NearBuy Systems launches cloud-based analytics service (8:25
2. Digby Launches LocalPoint (13:00)
3. CBS Outdoor B2B site goes mobile in Canada (16:50)
4. Foursquare adds menu listings (19:40)
5. Lumus lauches the PD-18-2 video screen glasses (23:50)