More than 425,000 cell phones are decommissioned each day in the United States, but that doesn’t mean people don’t want their phones. In fact, they can’t get enough of them and, even though big global brands including Samsung and Apple eat up a massive part of the global market, there is still plenty of money left over and plenty of companies that would like a piece of that action.

Now you can add Facebook and maybe Amazon to that list.Continue reading...

Since MTV aired “Video Killed the Radio Star” back in August of 1981, the company has gotten into plenty of things that haven’t involved music at all, from asking its viewers to “Rock the Vote” to exposing the world to the somehow fascinating mundane dramas of young adults on the Jersey shore. 

Now, Viacom’s MTV Networks International is getting into another business: selling branded tablets in India. Or, as the Telecom Tiger puts it, fablets (presumably, a more fab version of phablets). MTV has announced a partnership with Swipe Telecom to produce a co-branded fablet, MTV Volt.

The 6-inch smartphone features a television screen so people can get their MTV wherever they are. The youth-centric device will also serve as, “a fully functional high-definition Android tablet with Wi-Fi, dual cameras, FM player and GPS functionality,” that weighs half a pound and retails for around 12,999 Rupees or $240, Telecom Tiger reports. And, of course, built-in apps allow users to get right onto Facebook and LinkedIn.Continue reading...

In fall, Google promised a forthcoming major upgrade of its mobile payment system, Google Wallet. Despite some improvements, it's not here yet.

Instead, the company released a slight upgrade on Tuesday for Wallet — the program that allows users to combine store debit cards, gift cards, credit cards, and loyalty cards all onto a mobile device. Consumers tap it against devices at retail locations to make purchases.

The new version of the Android app, which originally launched in September 2011, has a new user interface and fixes that allow for better stability and battery life, NFCWorld.com reports. The new Wallet home screen features three tabs: "My Wallet," "Transactions" and "Explore." The latter showcases "featured" and "nearby" offers.Continue reading...

Mobile devices are fast becoming the accepted way for consumers to communicate, get information from the Internet, and take advantage of apps that help them do just about anything, which includes making travel easier. Case in point: Apple's Passbook, the new free app released to iPhone users with the upgrade to iOS6, is being pitched as an app that allows consumers to keep boarding passes from participating airlines (as well as movie tickets, retail coupons, loyalty cards and more) in one handy place.

Apple's new deal with London's Heathrow airport, which is looking to elevate its brand experience including rolling out digital improvements to make journeys better, offers a glimpse of how the application might function on a wider scale.

Imagine this: You walk past a store in the airport and a customized discount pops up on your iPhone. That's the basic premise — because passengers will be able to store their "WorldPoints" collected through a Heathrow loyalty card and access current retail offers and coupons with Passbook. Promotions and discounts will appear on a Passbook-enabled device throughout the customer's travel through the airport at the relevant stages of their journey. Heathrow's Passbook content will evolve to include both airport retailers and service providers. It's the first time such a program is being implemented in a European multi-retailer environment.Continue reading...

Collaborating with startups is becoming popular these days. GE funds a startup incubator program; PepsiCo is expanding its PepsiCo10 initiative, which pairs startups with brands such as Quaker; BMW's iVentures arm is a $100 million venture capital fund that's investing in mobile innovation; and Lexus is getting into the startup funding business.  Now you can add Mondelēz International to that list.

With a tagline of "The Future in 90 Days," the two-day old company's new Mobile Futures program was announced at the Mobile Marketing Association's Advertising Week conference in New York. The program is structured in two phases: scaling startup innovation, and creating entirely new mobile ventures by partnering entrepreneurs in the mobile space with "up to 10" Mondelez brands, as Mondelēz VP of Global Media and Consumer Engagement Bonin Bough told Ad Age.

Bough is bringing a solid track record to the task. He oversaw digital and consumer engagement at PepsiCo, including the now wrapped Pepsi Refresh Project crowdsourced community project-funding platform, before joining Kraft Foods in February. He's tapping that experience to spur mobile innovation at Mondelēz, the just-launched global corporate identity for Kraft Foods following Monday's spin-off of Kraft's North American consumer packaged brands.Continue reading...

Smartphones can do plenty of things. Now retailers are going to put them to work for them. Don’t feel like waiting in line at Walmart? Get yourself an iPhone.

The retail and technology giants have partnered up to create an app that is now being tested, one that will allow consumers to scan goods onto their iPhones and pay for them in a self checkout line, Reuters reports.

Walmart already offers a mobile app (at right) that can scan barcodes and check prices, along with a shopping list and basket, so self-checkouts are a natural extension as the mobile wallet business takes off, along with its @WalmartLabs R&D team exploring social and mobile commerce products and digital innovations such as semantic search.

The retailer promised earlier this year that it would put in more self checkout lanes into its stores as well as Sam’s Clubs, the wire service notes. If the test works out, the test will likely expand beyond Apple devices to Android and other mobile platforms. Apple's former retail chief is also bringing mobile self-checkouts to his new employer, JCPenney.Continue reading...

The U.S. Postal Service is fighting for its life, and under government pressure to find new ways to decrease costs and create new business models that made delivery more efficient. Cue mobile. 

As part of the USPS 2012 mobile commerce and personalization promotion, it's offering a 2% discount on Standard Mail and First-Class Mail letters, flats and cards that include a 2D mobile barcode — not much, but it's a start. Now SpyderLynk is sweetening the deal by offering those same customers a 10% discount for using SnapTags as their 2D mobile barcode.Continue reading...

Apple has found an unexpected, underserved cohort of consumers who can't get enough of the iPad — animals.

According to the Associated Press, six orangutans at Miami's Jungle Island are using iPads as part of an experiment in communication and mental stimulus. Their adoption habits pattern that of humans.

"Our young ones pick up on it. They understand it. It's like,`Oh I get this,'" said Linda Jacobs, who oversees the program. "Our two older ones, they just are not interested. I think they just figure, `I've gotten along just fine in this world without this communication-skill here and the iPad, and I don't need a computer.'"Continue reading...