User Interfaces 2009-2014: Enabling a compelling User Experience for the iPhone & Web 2.0 era

• Publication date: September 2009

Within a short timeframe, the iPhone series of devices has helped fuel adoption of mobile applications and web access in North America and Europe unlike any device before. In the seven years prior to the launch, the paucity of user-friendly mobile web-focused devices proved a major obstacle to optimal growth in users and traffic. Thanks to innovative multi-touch gesture user interfaces, faster processing and large screens, users are now mo...

Within a short timeframe, the iPhone series of devices has helped fuel adoption of mobile applications and web access in North America and Europe unlike any device before. In the seven years prior to the launch, the paucity of user-friendly mobile web-focused devices proved a major obstacle to optimal growth in users and traffic.

Thanks to innovative multi-touch gesture user interfaces, faster processing and large screens, users are now more aware of the benefits of web access with mobility. The introduction of advanced user interfaces has been pivotal in finally realising the possibility and benefit of mobile applications and web browsing to a wide audience, particularly in developed markets. Supported by increasing bandwidth in mobile networks, improved user experience has encouraged uptake, particularly as an extension of any given user’s online desktop experience, evidenced by the widespread adoption of mobile versions of leading social networking sites, through the browser, ODPs and other applications. This is illustrated by Apple through the iPhone, whose users in the UK are five times more likely to browse the web than owners of other mobile phones.

The move triggered a wave of touch interface releases with large screens from rival device manufacturers. Devices such as the HTC Hero and the Palm Pre signify a new generation in UI, which other market-leading forces such as Nokia, Samsung, LG, Motorola and Sony Ericsson will bolster through their own releases over the coming year. It is within this context that the development of user interface technologies forms a crucial component, providing the platform which will help generate new revenue streams from advertising and content/application downloads, on top of subscriptions.

The UI is a holistic term encompassing all elements of a handset (hardware and software) that contribute towards the end-user’s experience with a mobile device. It is the system of screen images, devices and software components that allows the user to interact with and control the handset's operating system.

Based on analysis of the position of key participants across the value chain, including operators, media agencies, software application providers, access providers, marketing specialists and trade association representatives, this 130+ page report analyses the market drivers and barriers affecting user interfaces, devices and applications.

Questions answered in this report include:

• How will the market for input devices develop? Which UI technology will dominate the market by 2011? Which new innovative solutions should be looked out for?
• How will display technologies improve and what revenues will be seen by 2014?
• What is the business case for an intuitive UI and to what extent can it increase data ARPU?
• Which services will gain most from an intuitive UI?
• What are vendors’ strategies with regards to proprietary OS in low end/mid range handsets?
• What are the benefits of a customised and customisable UI?
• How can Off-line Portals enhance the user experience in combination with the UI?
• How will the market for client server applications on mobile devices develop by 2011?
• What market share will the Series 60 and Series x0 UIs command by 2011?

Why you should buy this report:

• Network Operators: Gain insight into mean of increasing ARPU through the device itself. How to customise portals and products on the market
• Device Manufacturers: Understand how to customise the UI and gain competitive advantage in the process
• OEM/ODM: Learn how to plan for the handsets hardware/software elements
• Consultants: Understand the dynamics of the UI value chain and key players involved in this space
• Application developers: Develop the solutions needed by operators
• UI Vendors: Understand the market dynamics, market share and market evolution.

Global Phones And PDA Industry

Table of Contents

Executive Summary
E1. Success of the iPhone
E2. Simplifying the UI is Vital in Web 2.0 Era
E3. Product Differentiation with UI
E4. Dynamic UI for Mass Market Handsets
E5. Increasing Demand for Intuitive UI
E6. Market Forecasts

1. The iPhone and Web 2.0 Era
1.1 Introduction
1.2 iPhone
Table 1: iPhone Statistics
Chart 1: Total Global iPhone sales
Chart 2: iPhone Sales Q3 2007-Q2 2009
1.2.1 Apple: The Trend Setter
1.2.2 Changing the Rules of the Game
Table 2: Where iPhone Loses
Table 3: Where iPhone Wins
Figure 1: Display of Icons and Menu on Screens of Mobile Device
1.3 The Web 2.0 Era
1.4 Are the innovations brought about by Apple and others sufficient for the mobile industry to move into the Web 2.0 era?
Figure 2: Moving into 3D Realm
Table 4: UI Pitfalls to Avoid
1.5 Why Intuitive UI?
1.5.1 What is UI?
Figure 3: A Journey via Handsets Applications leads to User Experience
Figure 4: Layered Mobile Device Architecture (1)
1.5.2 Mobile UI
Figure 5: Layered Mobile Device Architecture (2)
1.5.3 UI Problems with the Traditional Handsets
Table 5: Key Handset Components that Contribute to User Experience
1.6 Importance of Mobile UI
1.7 Interest in Mobile UI
1.8 Aim
1.8.1 Key Questions Answered
1.9 Scope
1.9.1 Structure

2. Demands on User Experience in the iPhone and Web 2.0 Era
2.1 Key Ingredients for Enhancing UI in the Web 2.0 Era
Figure 6: iPhone's UI
2.1.1 Eye-catching and Dynamic Idle Screen
Table 6: Benefits of idle screen solutions
Table 7: Idle Screen pitfalls
2.1.1.1 Themes and Skins
2.1.1.2 ODP
2.1.1.2.1 Changing ODPs to offer Web 2.0 experience
2.1.1.2.2 ODP personalisation
Table 8: ODP Vendors
Table 9: Idle Screen Solutions
2.1.1.3 Active Idle Screen
Chart 3: Percentage Mobile Subscribers Browsing Internet (2009-2014)
2.1.2 Enhanced Start Menu
2.1.2.1 Hard and Soft Keys
2.1.2.2 Button Options on Mobile Devices
2.1.3 Highly Relevant Search & Discovery
2.1.4 Fast and Intuitive Browsers
Figure 7: Device and Browser/Site Usability
Table 10: Mobile Web Browsers
Chart 4: Browser Shipment in Millions (2009-2014)
2.1.4.1 Web Browser for S60
2.1.4.2 Safari for iPhone
2.1.4.3 SkyFire
2.1.4.4 Opera Mobile 9.5.1
2.1.5 Power of Expression with 2D and 3D Graphics
2.1.6 Consistent UI Experience across Applications
Figure 8: Evolution of Applications and OS
Table 11: Key interfaces and their suitability based on device type
2.1.7 GUI Tailored for the Specific Handset Features

3. Demands on Form Factor, Embedded OS and UI Platforms in the iPhone and Web 2.0 Era
3.1 Input options: Compatibility with the features supported by the Handset
3.1.1 Input or Data Entry in iPhone
Table 12: Input Methods used in Mobiles
3.1.1.1 Advantages/Disadvantages of Touch Screen
3.1.1.2 Market For Touch Screen Handsets
Chart 5: Touch Screen Handsets in Million units(2009-2014)
Chart 6: Selling Revenues from Touch Screen Handsets in $ Billions (2009-2014)
3.1.2 Key Data Entry Options
3.1.2.1 Keyboard Input
3.1.2.2 Numeric Keypads
3.1.2.3 QWERTY Keypads
Figure 9: QWERTY Keypads
Chart 7: QWERTY Keypad Sales with/without touch screen (2009-2014)
Chart 8: QWERTY Keypad Market Share in Smartphones and Feature Rich Phones
3.1.2.4 Foldable Keyboards
3.1.2.5 Keypad Agumentations
3.1.2.5.1 Predictive Text Input
3.1.2.6 Voice Input
3.1.2.7 Multimodality
3.1.2.8 Gesture input
3.1.2.9 Sensors
3.2 Display: Requirements for vivid colours, large screen and excellent image quality
Table 13: Limitations of Mobile Displays
3.2.1 iPhone's Display
3.2.2 Types of Mobile Displays
3.2.2.1 LCD
3.2.2.2 OLED
3.2.2.3 OLED over LED
3.2.3 Touch Screen Displays
3.2.3.1 Capacitance detection versus resistive technology
Figure 10: Resistive Screen
Figure 11: Capacitative Screen
3.2.4 Projector Display
3.2.5 Market for Display Technologies in Mobiles
Table 14: Comparison of Mobile Display Technologies
Chart 9: Display Technology Market Share (2014)
Chart 10: Display Technology
3.3 Open source OS which offers UI support
Table 15: Issues with Ubiquitous Adoption of Open OS
3.3.1 Impact of Open OS on UI
Table 16: Open OS on the Market
3.3.2 iPhone OS
3.3.3 UI Customisation with Symbian OS
3.3.4 UI Customisation with Windows Mobile 6.5
3.3.5 LiMO and UI customisation
3.3.5.1 Access
3.3.5.2 Azingo
3.3.6. UI Customisation with Palm webOS
3.3.7 UI Customisation with Android
Table 17: Operating Systems and their Support for UI
Table 18: Open OS Comparison
Table 19: UI Options with Open OS
Chart 11: OS Market Share (2009/2014)
Chart 12: Symbian OS Share Based on Geography
3.4 A customisable UI Layer
3.5 UI application platform must be resilient and dynamic
3.5.1 S60
Chart 13: S60 Market Share Forecast (2009-2014)
3.5.2 S40
3.5.3 UiOne
3.5.4 UIQ
3.6 Popular Middleware UI platforms for Mass market Devices
3.6.1 Brew
3.6.2 Adobe Flash Lite
3.6.3 Java
Figure 12: Java UI Components
3.6.4 Java, Brew and Flash Lite Market Share
3.7 UI Frameworks and Middleware Solutions
3.8 Ergonomics

4. Handset UI Requirements and Usability Analysis
4.1 Designing Intuitive UI
Figure 13: Handset Usability Analysis
Figure 14: Customer Demands From UI
Table 21: Requirements from UI in the Web 2.0 Era
4.1 Which Applications Will Drive Data Usage in the Web 2.0 Era?
4.1.1 Gaming
4.1.1.1 Vendors in the Gaming market
4.1.1.2 Growth in Gaming Market
Chart 14: Global Gaming Revenues
Chart 15: % Gaming revenues from different regions
4.1.2 Mobile TV
Chart 16: IPTV Subscriber Growth (2009-2015)
Chart 17: IPTV Revenues Growth (2009-2015)
4.3 Messaging Applications
4.4 Multimedia Messaging
Chart 18: MIM Revenue Growth (2009-2015)
Chart 19: Mobile Video Telephony Revenues (2009-2015)
Chart 20: PoC Subscriber Growth (2009-2015)
4.5 Mobile Internet Browsing and Searching
4.5.1 Market Growth for Browsing and Searching
Chart 21: Mobile Browsing Usage for February 2009
Chart 22: Mobile Search Engine Usage for February 2009

5. Analysing UI Attractiveness
5.1 Four UI Strategies for Market Penetration
Chart 23: Smartphone Market Share Vs the Mass Market Devices (2008-2014)
5.1.1 Targeting UI for mass market handsets
5.1.2 Segmentation
5.1.2.1 UI Specific to Segment and Geographical Market
5.1.2.2 DooPhone
5.1.2.3 Re-skinning is a thing of the past
5.1.2.4 Can handsets have their own personalities?
5.1.2.5 Idle Screen Customisation
5.1.2.6 Handling Mobile Complexity
5.1.2.7 Handset customisation is not the same as UI customisation
5.1.2.8 Provide an Ecosystem with intuitive UI on Handset
Table 22: Ecosystem for Mobiles
5.1.3 Multiple input interfaces
5.1.3.1 One Form Factor Strategy
5.1.4 Standards based approach
5.1.4.1 Browser Standards
5.1.4.1.1 OMPT
5.1.4.1.2 LIMO's support for BONDI
5.2 Benefits from UI Strategies
5.2.1 Competitive Advantage
5.2.1.1 Can UI provide competitive advantage?
5.2.1.2 Marketing UI
5.2.3 Increase Data ARPU
5.2.4 Promoting 3G, HSDPA and LTE
Chart 24: Data Traffic Per Radio Technology
5.3 Difficulties with UI strategies
Table 23: Key Success Factors for Operators and Device Manufacturers
5.3.1 UI Strategies adopted by top vendors
5.3.1.1 Samsung
5.3.1.2 LG
Chart 25: LG's Smartphone Shipment (2005-2008)
5.3.1.3 Nokia
5.3.1.4 Sony Ericsson
5.3.1.5 Motorola
Chart 26: Handset Vendor Market Share 2009
5.4 Business Case for UI
Chart 27: Global Mobile Subscriber Base in Billions (2003-2008)
Chart 28: Operator Revenues (2007-2014)
5.4.1 Market for Smartphones
Chart 29: Smartphone Sales Q1 2009
Chart 30: Smartphone Market Share Q1 2009
5.4.2 Key high speed technologies bolstering data ARPU
Chart 31: Global 3G Subscriber Growth (2007-2014)
Chart 32: Global 3G Subscriber Revenues (2008-2014)
5.4.3 Opportunity to Increase Data Revenue from Killer Applications
Chart 33: Revenues from Voice/Data Services (2015)
Chart 34: LTE Subscriber Growth (2009-2015)
Chart 35: LTE Operator Revenues (2009-2015)
Chart 36: Percentage Data Revenues Generated by Different Data Applications (2015)
Chart 37: Data revenues as a percentage of total revenues (2009-2015)
Chart 38: Global Data ARPU (2008-2015)
5.4.4 Handset Size and Cost
Chart 39: Breakdown of Handset Cost
Table 24: Mobile Device Comparison
5.4.5 WIDgets
Chart 40: Widget Platform Market (2008-2014)
5.4.6 Mobile Searchers and Browsers
5.4.7 ODP
5.4.8 LiMO Gains

6. New UI Solutions on the Horizon and Innovative Vendors
6.1 Sweeping UI innovations
6.1.1 TouchFlo
6.1.2 3D Touch Cube
6.1.3 Qualcomm MEMS Technologies
6.1.4 Oil and Water based Display
6.1.5 Foldable Displays
6.1.6 Modu
6.1.7 Zeemote
6.1.8 Semantic Analysis with Speech Recognition
6.1.9 Finger Print Sensor for Mobile Devices
6.1.10 Swype
6.1.11 Handwriting Recognition
6.1.12 Fully Multi-touch Based UI
6.1.13 3D Graphics Acceleration
6.1.14 Mobile Shell
6.1.15 Mode Shift
6.1.16 Multimodal Output
6.1.16.1 Haptics
6.1.17 Winged QWERTY Keypad
6.1.18 Themed UI
6.2 Innovative UI Vendors
6.2.1 Metaphor
6.2.2 Vlingo
6.2.3 Voice Signal
6.2.4 Lightmaker
6.2.5 Nuance
6.2.6 Fastap
6.2.7 Metaphor
6.3 UI Frameworks and Middleware Solutions Vendors
6.3.1 TAT
6.3.2 Digital Airways
6.3.3 GestureTek Mobile
6.3.4 Acrodea
6.5 Store Fronts Vendors
6.5.1 SurfKitchen
6.5.2 Celltick
6.5.3 FullPower
6.5.4 Pure Digital
6.5.5 Zumobi

7. Conclusion
7.1 Different Form Factors
7.2 Quality of Input/output device
7.3 Simplicity and Ease of Use
7.4 Benefits of Intuitive UI to the Players in the Wireless Value Chain
Table 25: UI Strategy Benefits for UI Value Chain Players
Table 26: Findings of the Report

Companies Mentioned

Abaxia
Access
AccuWeather.com
Acrodea
Action Engine
Aditon
ALJAWAL (Saudi Telecom)
Amazon.com,
AOL Tegic
Apple
ARM
Atrua
Azingo
Celltick
Cibenix
Cincinnati Bell Wireless
Cingular Wireless
Comstar-UTS
Digit Wireless
Digital Airways
Facebook
Fandango
Fastsearch
Flickr
FullPower
GestureTek Mobile
GetJar
Glofiish
GSMA
HTC
Immersion
Inflexion
Intromobile
Kvaleberg AS
LG
Lightmaker
LiMo Foundation
Macrovision
Maxis
Mentor Graphics
Metaphor Solutions
MobiComp
Modu
Morpho
Motorola
Movial
MSX
MTV
Nokia
NTT DoCoMo
Nuance
O2
Onskreen
Open Table
Openwave
Openwave Systems
Opera Platform
Orange
Pharos
Pure Digital
Qualcomm
RefreshMobile
Samsung
Skyfire
Sony Ericsson
Spb Mobile Shell
StubHub
SurfKitchen
Suri
Swype
Symbian
Synapsy
TAT
Tegic Communications
Telefonica
Telefonica Moviles Espana,
Telstra
Toshiba
UPEK
UTStarcom
Validity
Verizon
Vlingo Mobile
Voice Signal
Webwag
YouTube
ZeeMote
Zi Corporation
Zodiac Interactive
ZTE
Zumboi