ICMB 2012 - 11th ICMB Conference on adoption, use and effect of Mobile Systems and Applications

We invite academic and practitioners, information system researchers, mobile telecommunication experts, social and communication scientist to share their knowledge. We solicit high quality papers that address topics as mentioned in the overview of the tracks.

Mobile Business in Everyday life: users’ routines versus provider’s turbulence
Like ecommerce, mobile applications are becoming part of daily routines for consumers. Given the ease of use of smart phones and increasing mobile data network capacity, acceptance of mobile applications is increasing fast. Users switch to smartphones to deal with tasks they perform based on day-to-day routines, both in private life as well as in business environments. Academic research is shifting from acceptance and adoption issues to research questions that focus on usage patterns, preferences, substitution and displacement behavior and what the impact of Mobile Internet is going to be on daily routines.

What are the first and second order effects? Improved communication and information provisioning might be evident, but what about integration with other applications? Are mobile services going to be integrated with smart home systems? Is mobile going to be part of the larger ecosystem of ‘smart cities’ and the Internet of Things? And what does this mean for human behavior? Are mobile phones and tablets becoming the preferred way to deal with business routines, accessing ERP-systems, filling out expense forms, managing customer relations? How will mobile services be implemented in education systems? Are electronic books going to capture a part of the market? Is mobile TV changing to social mobile TV: sharing files across devices, making use of buddy lists? It will be clear that not only domains such as media, entertainment and communications will be affected, but that mobile and sensor-based applications are going to have an impact on many other domains as well: banking, logistics, energy, health care, independent living.

Any potentially stabilizing acceptance patterns in the user market are in sharp contrast with the turbulence that the mobile industry is going through due to the convergence of the content, application, Internet and the telecommunication industry. The provider eco-system around mobile Internet is now facing profound changes in business models and technical architectures. The emergence of various types of software platforms and end-to-end architectures in mobile systems is increasing the pressure on the dominant technological and business set-up of the mobile industry, to the point of a reconfiguration of the entire mobile system. Will new platforms for converged communication services or novel ad hoc paradigms offer an alternative for telecom operators to sustain their control over the mobile communication market? Can they co-exist or will Internet and IT firms make significant inroads into the telecommunications market? Are applications providers and app stores able to capture a major share of all service revenues? How clear is the distinction between infrastructure, platform and service? Are device manufacturers coming up with new mobile cloud based technologies that even could make it possible to avoid the distribution channels controlled by Webco’s like Apple and Android? Are businesses and governments able to integrate mobile applications in their service offerings to users? How are specific ‘vertical’ service offerings and industries changing because of these dynamics? What are policy and regulatory priorities for well-functioning mobile markets?

Program Co Chairs
Pieter Ballon
Christer Carlsson

Research tracks topics
Track 1: Technology
(Frank Berkers, TNO; Simon Delaere, SMIT-VU Brussel)
Infrastructure development, LTE
Standardization, and open and closed platforms
Enabling technologies
Sensor networks
Service platforms
Personalization and security
Ubiquitous computing
Track 2: Applications
(Niels Walraven, SMIT-VU Brussel; Jan Damsgard, Copenhagen Business School)
Smart Living
Mobile applications
Rich Communication Suites
Mobile Multi Media
Mobile 3.0 applications
Near Field Communication
Fixed Mobile convergence
Track 3: Business Applications
(Wolter Lemstra, TU Delft; Jan Ondrus, ESSEC Business School)
M2C applications
M Business applications
Business models and business modeling
Mobile platforms and eBusiness applications
Mobile platforms and eCommerce.
Mobile marketing
Track 4: Mob4dev
(Tina George, World Bank; Narciso Cerpa, University of Talca Chili)
Adoption, use and effect of mobile in developing economies
Mobile health care in developing countries
Mobile micro payments
Mobile logistics and accountability, use of RFID
Mobile entertainment in developing countries
Mobile banking and (micro) payments
Track 5: Mobile service platforms and eco-systems: theories and practice
(Mark de Reuver, TU Delft; Rahul Basole, Georgia Institute of Technology)
Platform theories, network effects and multi-sided mobile platforms
Platforms: organizational and technical interaction
Eco-systems, channels and platforms
Business strategies related to mobile platforms
New revenue (sharing) models around mobile platforms
Business models for mobile app stores and mobile search
Mobile service platforms and eCommerce/eBusiness
Platform models for the Internet of Things
Governance issues with regard to multi-actor eco-systems
Track 6: Theoretical perspectives: Mobile adoption (Acceptance), implementation, usage and effect studies
(Anna Sell, Åbo Akademi; Eusebio Scornavacca, Victoria University of Wellington)
User oriented theories, constructs, models
Theory development, theory testing and research methods
Consumer and Market research
Adoption and Acceptance research
Use of mobile in everyday life:
Mobile communication studies
Social Media and Mobile
Qualitative studies
Cultural studies of mobile usage
Track 7: Mobile application and a design science perspective
(Frank Tetard, Åbo Akademi; Felix Hampe, Koblenz-Landau University)
Designing mobile user experience
Design of apps in an organizational setting
Design and business models
Design approaches
Design and stakeholder management
Track 8: Regulatory, Economic and Policy issues
(Anders Henten, CMI Aalborg University; Jason Whalley, Stratclyde University Scotland)
Mobile applications in developing economies
Next Generation Networks (NGN)
Mobile Internet Governance
Privacy and Security Concerns
Mobile media platforms, and their architecture
Spectrum policy