The 7th Annual Web 2.0 Summit was held on November 15th, 16th and 17th. While I was not able to attend, I was able to view some of the amazing presentations and videos on their website. I suggest you spend the time to watch the videos of Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Twitter’s CEO Evan Williams and also Robin Li, Chairman & CEO of Baidu.
While I enjoy hearing these pundits speak, every year I really look forward to the straight facts on Internet Trends delivered in rapid fire order by Mary Meeker, the Managing Director from Morgan Stanley. I used some of these facts from Morgan Stanley last year to argue that Mobile Is Hot and Social Media is no longer about whether to do it but how to do it. This video is only18 minutes long but below are my key takeaways.
1. Globality: (her word not mine) 46% of Internet users are in just 5 countries: the U.S., Brazil, China, Russia and India. The penetration of Internet users in India is only 5%. The majority of Mobile Internet users are also in just 5 countries: the U.S., Japan, Indonesia, China and Brazil.
2. Mobile: 3G users have grown 37% year over year. And after 13 quarters, the growth curve of the amazing triumvirate of the iPod, iPhone and iPad is still nearly vertical and continues to far outpace any new product introduction ever. Smart phones will outpace PC shipments in just 2 years.
3. Social Ecosystems: The “innovators” typically overcome the “incumbents” in dominance. But not anymore as it is hard to decide whether you would rather be Apple, Google or Facebook.
4. Advertising: Mary actually showed a bit of her personality here as she nostalgically remembered that the good ads of yesteryear caused us all to act. But she says advertising is back as creative is becoming more relevant. There is still tremendous upside in the move to online as the percentage of time spent on the Internet still far outpaces the percent of ad spend. Mary thinks mobile usage will help fill this gap.
5. Commerce: Mary talks about how the rate of product improvement is unprecedented. Look to the number of iPad apps offered each day as evidence, she says. Mary also states that consumers want all products to be like a game experience and asks if your company is keeping up.
6. Media: Streaming video is up to 37% of Internet traffic during peak TV viewing hours. And YouTube content growth is actually accelerating to 35 hours of new content added every minute.
7. Internet Leadership: Mary shows a chart of leading Internet companies in 2004 and 2010. 7 companies on the list in 2010 were not on the list 6 years ago. She expects this pace of change to continue.
8. Steve Jobs: He gets a whole category because of his unique ability to innovate with the “mind of an engineer and the heart of an artist.”
9. Pace of Change: Mary explains that Mobile Connectivity is driving the pace of change. But she also says that the “Incumbents” are driving innovation like never before.
10. Mary’s Closing Thoughts
- Large companies do not typically maintain this kind of rapid growth. But she thinks it will continue.
- U.S. government spending plus interest will outpace revenue in 2025. Mary threw this chart in to be provocative and asked the audience to ponder what impact this might have on the business climate.
- Holiday spending in 2010 will be far better than the previous 2 years.
