Mobile Mage (mobilemage.com)

The world’s smartphone markets continued to build on their strong 4Q-2009 performance in the first three months of 2010. According to the latest ABI Research data, a little more than 55 million smartphones shipped during the quarter.

A consumer survey conducted by ABI Research in February, 2010 has found that 27% of mobile phone users accessing the mobile Internet have clicked on a mobile banner ad or text link. That compares to 21% in a previous survey conducted by the analyst firm in December, 2008.

MMA brokers first ever mobile industry cross-carrier best practices with Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile USA. Four largest U.S. wireless service providers consolidate their playbooks around MMA best practices, enabling $200 million in annual efficiencies and ensuring a consistent user experience.

The USA has knocked the UK off the top slot for mobile web browsing with 29% of the worldwide traffic, according to data released today by Bango. And the good news for content providers is that the growth in traffic is being matched by the growth in users paying for content on the mobile web.

According to surveys conducted by ABI Research in 2007 and 2008, 70% of respondents used their mobile phones to access information through Internet search engines last year. That represents a substantial 14% increase over 2007. The consumption of mobile data services, including search, has steadily increased year over year as indicated by the use of email and web from a mobile phone.

Mplayit Mobile Arcade fuels mobile content discovery across social networks, specifically Facebook and MySpace social platforms. The application lets people explore and trial mobile games in their web browser. Based on a sizable sample of Facebook and Myspace members, nearly every visitor tries out the mobile games, while a larger number return to check out new mobile games as they are added to the catalog.

With mobile subscriber adoption and financial transaction revenues to grow at more than 50%, ABI Research launches new “Mobile Money” research service. It provides market data, analysis, and forecasts relevant to all the major stakeholders in this market: banks, financial services organizations, credit card processors, chip manufacturers, mobile device OEMs, Near Field Communications (NFC) suppliers, mobile network operators, system integrators, merchants and more.