Mobile Business and Services - A systematic, business oriented approach

Abstract

In terms of business models, mobile commerce (MC) includes relations between customers, operators, ecommerce providers, payment providers, and other parties. There is a growing number of publications on MC sometimes labeled as research. But most of this work should be better called market studies or benchmarks. They highlight different aspects such as the number of prospective consumers, the estimated market volume, etc which do not really provide deeper insights . Well known sources for this kind of information are Arthur D. Little, Ovum, Durlacher, Merrill Lynch, Gartner, Forrester and others. They all try to estimate the perspectives of the mobile market(s) by using figures on mobile phone penetration, SMS usage, mobile internet access etc. Many of the remaining publications are technically oriented (for an overview see e.g. Prasad et al. 2000, Muller-Veerse 2000, Webb 1999). So what we are generally missing are concepts and guidelines for developing the mobile business, which something the MIS field can undertake. It is the purpose of this paper to contribute to a solution by providing a structured view of the major areas from a business point of view.