Finnish Mobile Association

As the saying goes: there is no rest for the wicked. But the wicked goes through much drama just to get some rest. Take our mobile flyer Peter G. Mr. multi-tasker extraodinaire just had to catch the stomach flu. A sorry excuse to do planning for the upcoming FinnMob USA tour from the comforts of his bed rather than the comforts of his favorite couch at the FinnMob lounge. I suspect his weakened state has more to do with the amount of tapas he consumed during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, but that’s another story.

So Peter G, along with the bizdev team, has been putting together the finishing touches to a series of meetings in Texas, Nevada and California. Consider FinnMob’s campaign at MWC 2010 as a mere dress rehearsal for these events. The crew will begin their roadtrip at SXSW 2010 in Austin, 12-21 March, followed by a gruelling drive through the Nevada desert and a stop-over in the Las Vegas oasis featuring CTIA Wireless, 23-25 March, then a quick hop to San Francisco and Silicon Valley for Plug & Play, 25 March, and the Telecom Council, 26 March. Sorry to report that as of deadline for this blog, Peter G did not schedule the Zen-ish experience of hot tubs and white wine on a rainy day in Napa Valley, but he should be able to reserve a table for you at the Iberia restaurant in Menlo Park, for some tapas, in case you missed MWC 2010.

All the events in the tour’s schedule are great venues for prospecting. And to engage prospects from multiple ecosystems, SXSW in Austin is the place to meet executives from the music, film and digital ecosystems. You should have already received your invitation and the tour’s brochure included in the FinnMob newsletter. If not, roll-up and ping Ismo Rantala, Peter G, or Roger G. P to get more details.

Be gone with the Winter Olympics. My Quebecian friend André Chaker has finally stopped reminding me about Canada’s 14 gold medals, so it is time to refocus on the North American market south of Canada. Pew Internet Center’s headline on news consumption in the US piqued my interest. Further evidence that Americans, south of Canada, are catching up on the mobility scene, so you FinnMob bizdevs out there need to revise your numbers. Checkout http://bit.ly/cV97kg, and while you’re at it, take a look at Chetan Sharma’s numbers on US wireless data for the fourth quarter of 2009: http://bit.ly/bISObs.

FinnMobsters had a heck of a week in Barcelona during the buzzy, public relations stunts filled tradeshow, but by the time the teams hopped on their flights back home, all of them had a significant number of prospects in their pockets. And as we put the finishing touches to this newsletter, follow-up enquiries are coming in from Asia, U.S. and Europe.

Dazzboard, Xtract, Sendandsee, Powerkiss, Notava, On2 Technologies, Ixonos, IIF, and Technopolis Ventures showcased their wares in hall 4, while colleagues from UpCode, Cellictica, and Openbit used FinnMob’s Powerbar in hall 1 as home base for their guerrilla marketing skirmishes through the tradeshow’s thousands of square meters.

Many visitors to FinnMob’s Powerbar mentioned the more positive mood in the show compared to last year, while some, who considered themselves veterans going back from the Cannes days, moaned about the lack of real innovative stuff. The advantage of being a bartender at the Powerbar was that I heard lots of great stories and industry analyses. I walked away from the tradeshow with these observations:

• The old adage about innovations happening in the periphery of networks has its counterpart in the presentation of innovative companies in shows like MWC—one had to go to the far end of the tradeshow to see them.
• Mobile applications and services are keystones to industry growth.
• Guerilla style marketing should be part of any start-up’s tactics.
• Talks, especially those spread via the media about Europe’s lost edge in mobile innovation is premature.

The main story from Barcelona should have been about small innovative companies rather than the industry Goliaths flexing their muscles. I had enough time to wonder where we are now in the life cycle of our industry, as I shuttled back and forth between halls 1 and 4 of the tradeshow, and the terms “box moving” and “value-added” services came to mind. At one point in the saga of the computer industry, incumbent hardware manufacturers began losing their hold on customers as smaller, hungry and very innovative players began introducing smaller “boxes” shipped with their flavor of Unix. I am sure there are still plenty of you out there who have been around long enough to remember how the industry cycled through the different proprietary platforms, to Unix-based platforms to Microsoft, etc. Let us switch over to the mobility story. Where are we today? We have boxes. They are smaller. Or rather, their sizes come in variations of small; they are shipped with software in variations of proprietary. Back to Barcelona, February 2010. Twenty-first century box movers introduced their latest and greatest. But wait a moment, what is Google doing in this picture? And why was the buzz louder among the mobile content and service bunch? Where and when have we seen this before? If you are a FinnMobster and you have a twinkle in your eyes as you read this, you rock.

FinnMobsters from Oulu must have plenty to smile about. Less than three years after Hantro’s successful sale to On2 Technologies, Google picked-up On2 and completed its 124.6 million dollar acquisition on 19 February after On2 shareholders approved the deal. On2 common stock will be converted to the right to 15 cents per share and 0.0010 of a share of Google common stock, according to Google.

Lots of speculations about Google’s motives for the purchase and its aims for On2’s VP8, so stay tuned.

Powerkiss’ CEO Maija Itkonen had her hands full. She started day 2 at MWC 2010 fielding questions from Samsung’s representative, and even more questions from passers-by as she showed wireless charging of mobile phones at FinnMob’s Powerbar.

Watching our local mobile mastermind Peter Vesterbacka in action at FinnMob’s Powerbar. The guy simply gets physical with the tradeshow visitors, and he gets them going, and sweating and thirsty. Too bad we did not bring enough Lapin Kulta beer with us.

Mobile World Congress 2010 opened its doors with usual flair, on a cool grey, rainy day in Barcelona, complete with id checks for the dark-suited masses during the rush through the gates. But no problema. FinMob’ers–dazzboard, sendandsee, powerkiss, Xtract, Notava, Ixonos, Tecnopolis, On2 Technologies and Invest in Finland–plowed through the buzzy day.

“This opening day is only a warm-up, although every minute of my day has been booked. Lots of very interesting companies, and I am looking forward to the next full round of meetings tomorrow”, said Will Cardwell, Director of Technopolis Development Services.

Monday’s highlights included: Jeff Pulver and Friends’ breakfast co-hosted by FinnMob and IMA–the Israel Mobile & Communication Association; Sendandsee’s launch of mobiprint Twitter and O [circle] Services; Nokia’s Ovi Map milestone with more than 3 million downloads, and the company’s announcement of a partnership with Intel to create a new operating system from their Maemo and Moblin platforms; and of course Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 announcements.

Several MWC veterans, who stopped-by FinnMob’s stand, said attendance seemed lighter than last year. This tradeshow’s traffic on opening day is typically lighter than the rest of the week, but many early birds, ensured they had FinnMob’s stands in Halls 1 and 4 on their iterinary.

Nokia’s noticeable absence from the venue fueled much discussion at the various off-site gatherings around Barcelona, including at Mobile Sunday’s cooler than cool get together organized by our Spanish friends at Vintage Barcelona. Most of the mobile operators seemed to have gone on the stealth mode. Given that many SME’s come to MWC 2010 and invest a not so small part of their marketing budget to have an efficient week of meetings, particularly with mobile operators, one has to wonder whether MWC is the right venue anymore. For starters, the id check at the gate has got to go.

Sendandsee launched its patented mobile service mobiprint Twitter at the opening day of the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. “We see this feature as an important add-on to existing mobile services. It can integrate user-generated content and discussions back to the original story, creating a loop with many opportunities.” says Jorma Kario, Sendandsee’s vice president.

Dazzboard has been in the news lately, receiving 1.5 million USD to finance growth to global markets. HTT Sixgen led the investment round, followed by additional funding from Veraventure.

Technopolis has released its first annual report tracking venture capital and angel investments to Finnish high techs. Investment activity last year closed higher than expected, with 58 companies receiving investments worth €101 million, but investors shun large scale investments, compared to 2008 when WinWind and Blyk together received €160 million.