By Sandra Sieber, IESE professor
Real competitiveness, direct distribution via Internet with very economic prices (or even free), a spectacular boom of offers…the business model for mobile applications is far more democratic than the one that has dominated the market for professional desktop computers for a quarter of a century.


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Source: ASIMELEC
Date: June 2009
Abstract: ASIMELEC, one of the two employers' associations for the Spanish ICT sector, has published its first report on the progress of that market. According to its data, the ICT macrosector last year had a total revenue of 77.4 billion euros, which equates to 7.07% of the Spanish GDP and over 350,000 direct jobs. The report also highlights the relatively positive performance of software, which grew 7.9%, and services (7.1%). The two segments offset the poor results posted by consumer electronics, which fell 11%, and telecommunications equipment, which was down 6.4%.
 
At the press conference, the president of ASIMELEC, Martín Pérez, explained that the ICT market is "one of the sectors least affected by the crisis," since despite the downturn it managed to grow 0.1%. Pérez also predicted that in 2009 the sector would slip 4 points in revenues due to such factors as reduced demand, the decline in margins and users currently opting for lower-range solutions. In any event, these forecasts will be verified in the next report, the second in a collection targeted for annual release, and which complements other studies available on similar topics, particularly that of AETIC, the other major ICT employers' association.

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Title: Consulting in Spain in 2008
Source: Spanish Association of Consulting Firms (EAC)
Date: June 2009
Abstract: 2008 was a good year to be in the consulting business. Consulting firms in Spain and other countries generated revenues of 9.5 billion euros, primarily from the development and integration of applications (43%), and the ever-growing activity of outsourcing (37%). These results entail an overall increase of 11%, exceeding the projections made by the EAC midway through 2008 and high above the average for the Spanish economy. The bulk of the demand for consulting came from public-administration institutions, operators and financial services companies, the latter of which invoiced 2.566 billion euros, 27% of the total revenues posted by the consultancies. The EAC explained that the positive numbers from 2008 are thanks to jobs that had been contracted previously and added that the results from 2009 will most likely be lower. The association is hoping that the integration of financial entities will spur on new contracts and is banking on the progressive demand coming from small and medium-size businesses. The publication is available as a PDF download or on request as a print edition.

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The popularity of Web 2.0 continues to grow and the prestige of social networks is soaring. Facebook, for instance, has 307.1 million users and MySpace, 126.9 million. Twitter, whose role as an alternative means of communication in the recent episodes in Moldavia and Iran has been extremely prominent in the media (the idea of "twitterized" revolutions has emerged), celebrates its third birthday with 18 million monthly visitors, according to Nielsen.

This progression at the end of last year and in early 2009 made it seem like these businesses were among the few that would escape the crisis. Others were not so optimistic. Now it appears as though the latter were more on the mark. "The expected growth in spending on social networks in 2009 ended up being half of what eMarketer had projected in December 2007," eMarketer analyst Debra Aho Williamson was quoted in the online magazine marketingdirecto. The question is that its business model is still in the air and the general crisis is not exactly helping that, and the door has been opened to restructuring processes. The most recent of these involved MySpace, presently owned by News Corp., which has announced it will be concentrating its offices in London, Berlin and Sydney after closing its other international offices and laying off 300 employees. Right now, the most urgent thing is not growth, but rather ensuring economic viability.

Articles in El Mundo (spanish), Tendencias21 (spanish), Technology Review, Le Monde (french), Marketing Directo (spanish), and Baquía (spanish)

Standardization simplifies life, though not everyone comes out a winner, as the processes behind it often prove to be more laborious than expected. In addition to factoring in all of the interests involved, it is vital to ensure that the regulations do not stunt innovation. But with each new agreement reached, another barrier comes down. T.S. Eliot was clear on this back in the early 20th century: "The agreement between Great Britain and the United States to standardize nuts and bolts, so that someone could purchase a bolt in one country and then fit it with a screw manufactured in the other, seems to me the most important news story of the day, despite the little attention given to it in the press. It was also a presage,” he wrote. If the famous critic and poet were alive today, he could say the same of the recent commitment by the industry presented to the European Community to standardize the universal cell-phone charger, which will become a reality as of 2010 and use a USB connector. "The days are numbered for the dictatorship of the little plug," declared R. Muñoz matter-of-factly in the Spanish newspaper El País.

The agreement has been signed by Nokia, Apple, RIM, LG, NEC, Motorola, Samsung, Qualcomm, Sony Ericsson and Texas Instruments, which account for 90% of the market, and seeks to not only simplify things for users, improve safety and bring down the cost of devices (which will no longer be required to come with chargers), but also to protect the environment. "With each purchase of a cell phone, a product that has a short life cycle, the consumer receives a new charger, and these start to build up in mass amounts," says Günter Verheugen, Vice-President of the European Commission.

The measure was spurred on by an EC warning that if the industry did not reach an agreement voluntarily then it would create regulations to impose the charger universal. It is the first step in an even more ambitious objective. The Vice-President of the European Commission is making progress toward his desire for this agreement to be extended later to include other electronic products, such as laptop computers, cameras and media players, although he admitted that having "a single charger that is compatible with all of your electronic devices" is a complicated undertaking, according to the Agencia AFP press release.

Articles in spanish AFP and El País