mobile
Mobile App only approach: Is it user friendly?
We have been using smartphones from quite a while. And in the process we access a lot of websites and apps through our devices.
It is a fact that we have reduced our consumption from the desktop web and shifted a good bit to the mobile web. Yet there are websites and services which we religiously use through our PCs or Laptops.
One of the baffling announcements of the week came from a major player in fashion eCommerce playground, Myntra. It decided to shut down its website from May 1 in lieu of luring customers to their mobile application. Understandably as the mobile sales and usage increases more services would be accessed from smartphones. But that doesn’t mean that desktop consumption should die down.
Customers may find it difficult to browse through the entire catalog of cloths and shop from it from a small screen. The sales figure may show that people are buying more from mobile app. One factor for that can be discounts offered on the mobile platform. So users might be giving up a part of the user experience to save more money.
Another annoying thing users have noticed is recently many services including Flipkart has been redirecting users to install their app if a link is opened on a web browser on a smartphone. For regular customers having an app might help but for the people who would want to make one off purchase it is another app on their mobile phones eating away data, battery and memory.
Ads for installing native app have been popping up on every website you visit. And sometimes it is not even easy to get rid of it. The awkward hanging ad in the middle of your screen when you’re trying to view some content is annoying. It is apparent that services would want the users to use their app. But every time an ad or redirection is downright annoying. And on many instances the links in app don’t work properly.
Users should be given a choice of platform until it is blatantly clear that one platform usage is negligible.
Mapping it up
CES 2015: Product List
- Acer
- Acer Aspire V17 : A 17.3 inch full HD laptop with 3D camera
- Acer Chromebook 15 : A powerful chromebook with Intel Broadwell processors.
- Acer Liquid Z410 : A refresh of Acer Liquid with 64 bit SoC and 4G Support.
- Alctel
- Pixie 3 : A series of phones with choices of size and OS from Android, Windows or Firefox.
- One Touch Watch : Alctel’s smartwatch running a propitiatory OS, the watch works with Android phones.
- Asus
- Zenfone 2 : Asus’ new flagship android phone.
- Coloud
- Coloud Snap Active : Funky earphones with features like reflective cable and anchorloop.
- Connected Cycle
- Smart Pedal : A smart pedal for bicycles.
- Fugoo
- Style XL: A 360 bluetooth speaker which is waterproof.
- Garmin
- Fenix 3: A smart multi sport GPS watch.
- The Epix : For a new way of handsfree navigation.
- VivoActive watch: Garmin’s smartwatch.
- Griffin (Link to all the products)
- Powerdock pro: A powerdock to charge upto 5 of your devices.
- Power block 3: A space saving wall charger to charge upto 3 USB charged devices.
- Twenty Bluetooth Amplifier : A wireless amplifier for all your speakers and music systems.
- iTrip Aux: Bluetooth to AUX audio solution.
- HP
- HP Z24s : A 23.8 inch 4K display.
- HP Z27s: A 27 inch 4K display.
- HP Z27q: A 27 inch 5K display.
- HP Envy 34c: A 34 inch curved display.
- HP ZvR: A Virtual reality display by HP.
- Hyundai
- Hyundai Blue Link : An smartphone and smartwatch app to open and start your car.
- KwikSet
- Kivo : Unlock your door from your smartphone.
- Kodak
- Instamatic 5 : Kodak’s first attempt on an Android camera phone.
- NVidia:
- NVidia Drive CX: A cockpit computational box for your car.
- NVidia Tegra X1 : A mobile super CPU.
- Lenovo
- Lenovo Thinkpad Carbon X1: Ultralight performance ultrabook.
- Vibe Band: An E-Ink display wearable costing under $100
- P90 : A smartphone utilizing Intel’s Atom64 and LTE advanced technology.
- Vibe X2: The revamp of the Vibe series with 64 bit Qualcomm processor.
- Vibe Selfie Flash: A pocket size flash lights which plugs into audio jacks to give you better lightning for photos.
- LG
- 34UM67 : LG’s 21:9 extra wide monitor.
- 34UC97,34UC87M : Curved 21:9 monitors with 178 degrees of viewing angle.
- 31MU97 : LG’s 4K cinema monitor.
- A smartwatch made with Audi as a partner.
- A smart washing machine which can do two loads at a time.
- Misfit
- Bolt : A $50 plug and play smart bulb.
- Narrative
- Narrative Clip 2 : New avatar of the wearable camera.
- Netatmo
- Netatmo Camera: A home camera to keep track of the things remotely.
- Parrot
- Zik Sport : A new breed of wireless sport headphones
- Seagate
- Seagate 7: A 7 mm thick 500 GB portable drive by Seagate.
- Seagate Wireless : Wireless storage for the use of all of your devices.
- LaCie Mirror : A Storage device with mirror display protected by Corning Gorilla Glass.
- LaCie Rugged RAID : A Rugged Storage with USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt support.
- Slow Control
- Baby GLGL: A Smart Baby bottle.
- Withings
- Activité Pop: A fitness tracker which looks like a beautiful analog watch.
- Zuli
- SmartPlugs : Make any light a smart light.
War of middle earth in mobile
When the war on the frontline cools down it shifts to the middle. Right now that is the state of the mobile world. All the companies has boiled down to growing markets like India to get their share after seeing the success of the Moto G.
Earlier in India Mircomax and to some extent companies like Karbonn and a Lava used to rule the 8k to 15k section. Samsung had Galaxy Y and Ace, Sony had Xperia pop and HTC had a few phones from desire series. They were popular but you can’ t certainly call them hits. People used them because of lack of options.
Mircomax had very nice models around 12k of Canvas series like Canvas 2 and Canvas HD. One thing they offered people was good hardware. Bigger and better displays, faster processors and decent camera. Although software was not up to the mark, it was okay for entry level users.
Moto G changed the game all over. It offered unbelievably good experience. Stock android with Moto enhancements was peach for the users at that price. As soon as it became highest selling model for Moto, OEMs turned their head towards India. Motorola took another step to launch the Entry level Moto E. Response was fantastic.
Chinese companies now came around. Gionee entered the market with its stylish Elife series of phones. Then Taiwanese company Asus which already had some phones in the market launched the Zenphone series recently. They are even claiming that they sold 40000 phones in 4 days.
However it is the latest entrant that is making people go gaga over it. And it is Xiomi, nicknamed “Apple of China” with their super hit phone Mi3. Loaded with snapdragon 800 processor, 13 MP camera with Sony lens, MIUI software based on Android kitkat and impressive 3050mAh battery. It has been getting rave reviews for loading this much for just 14k. Xiomi Mi3 review.
A new strategy is applied for sales by companies like Motorola, Asus and Xiomi is they have tied up with Flipkart. By this they have bypassed the entire retail supply chain. It is a good deal for both the website and the OEMs.
The market is heating up in this space. We will see new phones every now and then. And it will be a sweet headache for the consumer. Google will also be joining hands with Micromax, Karbonn and Spice for Android One program. It is early to declare a winner but it will be a hell of a battle
Micromax: Stepping towards the big league
The History
Few years ago there were suddenly flurry of mobile companies in India which started manufacturing devices. By common Indian people they were called ‘Chinese’ device makers even though the producing took place in the Indian market. Today after all of fury, fighting, and hungry advertising there is only one clear winner that rose above all: Micromax.
Around year 2009 there was a boom in Indian ‘smartphone’ market, every day people saw a new advertisement on TV of relatively unknown mobile company. Lava, Karbonn, Maxx, MicroMax, G’Five, Lemon and thousands of others. They produced very cheap feature phones and Android smartphones to get the foothold in the market. Now obviously there was direct competition with the big players like Samsung, LG, and HTC etc around lower end smartphone range.
So these companies started to pack features and specifications with cheap chips into the smartphones to make them look like super flagship phones of big daddies. If someone would have looked at the spec sheets and would not know about the company they would say, “Whoa! I am almost getting features of a Galaxy or One device at third of the price”. And for Indian crowd it was enough.
Another way they took up is marketing strategy. During the famous cricket tournament Indian Premier League, Karbonn publicized the brand by ‘Karbonn Kamaal Catch’, And Maxx announced man of the match award. Other companies also had some or other kind of awards given to the players and commentary phrases so the brand becomes a catch phrase.
The Rise
But for every company there has been one phone that would mark their stamp on the industry. Galaxy S2 for Samsung, iPhone for Apple (No shit Sherlock!), HTC One for HTC and the list goes on. Micromax produced that one gem and gained pole position by a mile. That device was Mircomax Canvas 2. Announced in 2012 October, the phone was a beast on paper. It was a 5’’ device with, 512 MB RAM, 8 MP Camera, Android 4.0.4, dual core cortex processor. These all for around 10k was a big deal. And the phone delivered. Of course it wasn’t the smoothest but it was way ahead of phones of that category and one above.
The price and good performance lured Indian users to go extra few bucks from a feature phone and buy this device. And it was a smash hit. Soon they started rolling out more and more amazing devices which compete directly with giants. They made Canvas series their ‘Galaxy series’ and bombarded the market with different models of feature and design twist. This resulted into cementing the trust and value of the brand in the market.
Entering the big league
Recently Micromax launched their first Octacore powered phone featuring MediaTek’s chipset which has been supplying hardware core to Chinese and Taiwanese companies. This phone also features a monster 16 megapixel camera. While these are ‘WOW’ features to look at one front micromax has been lacking and that is software.
Till 2010-11 hardware had a major say in smartphones than software. But Nexus series and Google changed that perspective with Android. Packed with nifty tricks and solid framework to make the full use of the hardware underneath. They really made smartphones superphones. And other companies followed the suit. The user now also looks on the version of software the phone uses and how fast it can receive updates.
It was all hunky dory for Micromax in lower and middle range of phones as the users of that sections are not always power users. But when you want to play world cup you ought to have best support staff with best players. Let’s face it you can’t just have your recently launched flagship phone running on 4.2.2 (Jelly Beans) while world is toying with Kitkat (4.4.2). Next logical step for Micromax would be to ramp up the software team. They can even have partnership with someone like CyangenoMod who are experts when it comes to Android code. There is no shortage in India when it comes to coding talent. So it won’t be tough to acquire talent.
I would like to see Micromax upping their game and become a real competitor.
image source: GSMARENA