Mobile application and its global impact

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International Journal of Engineering & Technology IJET-IJENS Vol: 10 No: 06 104
107506-0909 IJET-IJENS © December 2010 IJENS I J E N S
Mobile Application and Its Global Impact
Md. Rashedul Islam1, Md. Rofiqul Islam2, Tohidul Arafhin Mazumder3
1Lecturer, Dept. of CSE, LU, Bangladesh, 1 2 3M.Sc Student,Högskolan i Borås, Sweden
Abstract-This paper presents the uses and effect of mobile
application in individuals, business and social area. In
modern information and communication age mobile
application is one of the most concerned and rapidly
developing areas. This paper demonstrates that how
individual mobile user facilitate using mobile application
and the popularity of the mobile application. Here we are
presenting the consequence of mobile application in
business sector. Different statistical data of the past and
present situation of mobile application from different
parts of the world has been presented here to express the
impact. This paper also presents some effect of mobile
application on society from the ethical perspective.
Key-words- Business consequence, Business promotion,
Ethical views, Mobile application, social effect.
1. INTRODUCTION
In the modern age of Information and communication
system, people are habituated to use computer and
computer application. But Mobile Application uses and
development is a new and rapidly growing sector.
There is a global positive impact of mobile application.
Using mobile application developed country are
becoming facilitate and people, society of developing
country are upgrading themselves and making a new
type of IT infrastructure. Mobile applications are
running on a small hand hold mobile device which is
moveable, easy to use and accessible from anywhere
and any place. Now a day, so many people are using
mobile application to contact friends, browse internet,
file content management, document creating and
handling, entertainment etc. From everywhere user can
get facility of mobile application. People can do many
things of his daily life and business life. Not only the
mobile application has an impact for user but also it
plays an important role in business. Many business
companies are earning revenue using mobile
application. The mobile application has an impact on
society. The mobile application run in a mobile
environment which usability depends on several factors
such as: Screen resolution, Hardware limitations,
Expensive Data Usage, Connectivity issues, Limited
Interaction possibilities. Last few years the mobile
companies are trying to develop mobile device with
more screen resolution, more storage, better
connectivity which provide better environment for
modern mobile application.
2. MOBILE APPLICATION OVERVIEW
Mobile applications are consist of software/set of
program that runs on a mobile device and perform
certain tasks for the user. Mobile application is a new
and fast developing Segment of the global Information
and Communication Technology. Mobile application is
easy, user friendly, inexpensive, downloadable and run
able in most of the mobile phone including inexpensive
and entry level phone. The mobile application has wide
uses for its vast functioning area like calling,
messaging, browsing, chatting, social network
communication, audio, video, game etc
In large number of mobile application some are pre-
installed in phone and others user can download from
internet and install it in mobile phone. This large
number of mobile application market served by
increasing no of mobile application developer,
publishers and providers. From the technical point of
view the different mobile applications are run able in
different managed platforms like iPhone, BlackBerry,
Android, Symbian, windows; also some virtual machine
such as Java/J2ME, BREW, Flash Light, Silverlight.
According to application area, there are different
categories of mobile application.
1. Communications: Internet Browsing, email IM
client, Social Networking
2. Games: Puzzle/ Strategy, Cards /Casino,
Action/ Adventure
3. Multimedia: Graphics /Image viewer,
Presentations viewers, Video Players, Audio
players
4. Productivity: Calendars, Calculators, Diary,
Notepad /Memo/Word Processors,
Spreadsheets
5. Travel: City guide, Currency converter,
Translators, GPS/Maps, Itineraries / Schedules
, Weather
6. Utilities: Profile manager, Idle screen/Screen
saver, Address book, Task manager, Call
manager, File manager
2.1. Past and Present of Mobile Application
At first the mobile application comes as a simplest way
with our early cell phones, alarm clocks, currency
calculators etc. At that time people just used mobile
application for receiving call messaging, doing simple
calculations etc. But the mobile application developers
all time kept focus on “Why Simple?” But they knew

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that, in the future the mobile application will explore
with its vast feature and everybody will use it.
In 2000 the mobile application developers were talking
about internet based mobile application. By those
mobile application people can connect them to internet
for their daily importance. There are some parts of the
world where the mobile industry was running late like
EUA. In that part of the world the mobile network were
not so advanced. So, good expectation about mobile
application from that part is a funny thing. But if we
think about Europe, world biggest mobile company like
Nokia, Ericsson etc made their headquarters, from that
area the mobile innovation came out. The main problem
is that those companies were making cell phone for the
mobile operator also they were making the mobile
application. But they may be slow things down. Those
created a gap between developer and the customer. It
was created a frustration for the developer whatever
they developed, when it was coming or it never coming.
In America 6 years ago, a company announced that they
were launching a cell phone which will be change the
motive of market. They didn’t care about the list of
request of the operator. They wanted to create a cell
phone and mobile application which will be featured for
the market, and finally they did. The iPhone, when it
was released it became most wanted within last few
years. And other cell phone companies are still trying to
copy with it. The main feature of this cell phone was it
had a fantastic platform which allowed running very
dynamic application based on internet. They have been
sold so many applications. Also Nokia launched its
Application Store. For example, Nokia using Symbian
operating system and there is big application market
named “Ovi Store”. Where we can finds so many
applications for our daily needs. Also it is a great place
for developer. Also Sony Ericsson has Android OS and
Android Market.
The most application is based on Internet and serve
fantastic feature. And then the internet use from mobile
increase dramatically. Those mobile application are
being design to help us in our daily life and allow us to
connect with internet, interact with world, getting
information from distance place, social communication
using facebook or twitter, identifying location etc. You
are going back to home so you can open air-conditioner
using mobile before reach to home. Also you can get
alarm of your car or your home to you cell phone and
so on.
In 2008 there was a milestone that the Mobile
broadband subscriptions overtook fixed broadband
subscribers for the first time [4][5]. But Mobile Web
accesses are still now suffers from usability and
interoperability problems.
Fig-1: Mobile broadband subscriptions overtook fixed broadband in 2008 (From [5])
2.2. Present Uses of Mobile Application
From the last few years every mobile company are
making the smartphone and feature phone. And
increasing the computing power of those mobile phone,
rapidly increase the smart mobile application. Most of
the people from developed countries including America
and Europe can’t imagine leaving home without
mobile. Not only the developed countries but also the
developing countries the mobile application uses rate
growth rapidly. The mobile application are using in
Mobile broadband
subscriptions
overtook fixed
broadband

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different areas. We are going to explain some major
used area.
Let’s think about communication like internet
browsing, Voice chat, Facebook, Twitter etc. Now a
day every standard mobile has Facebook application.
User can share with their friends and family from
anywhere and any place like in car, in train. People can
use messenger for chatting. We can generate call to any
corner of the world with low cost using VoIP
application and internet.
Then we can talk about GPS System. Current position
locating in map, Road navigation, vehicle tracking etc
are the most uses application using GPS system. The
Google Map helps us to find out any place.
Using mobile commerce we can view product, select
product and order for product. Sometime mobile
application Mobile Wallet uses in restaurant or market
for completing payment. People can doing business
work using mobile application. Mobile banking and
eTicketing is another feature of mobile application.
Some time we can use mobile application with support
of internet connection for controlling the home device
from remote place. Business people are doing business
from out of office.
People can watch video and movie from YouTube
directly using mobile application. They can play video
and audio. Kids can play game in mobile which is also
one kind of mobile application.
According to a study by MobiLens [12], the number of
mobile application user in US grew by 28% between
April 2009 and April 2010. Here is a table of growth
rate of all application categories in one year up to April
2010.
Fig-2: Growth rate of all application categories in one year up
to April 2010 (From [12]).
The Nielsen company, released a survey in September
2010 has been published a report of downloading and
mobile application [7]. In that survey they shows some
important statistical data of the mobile application of 30
days.
According the survey, the following figure represents
the uses rate of different category of mobile application.
Fig-3: Category of app used in 30 days at August 2010. (From [7])
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
GrowthRate(%)

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2.3. Future of Mobile Application
According to the previous study of mobile application
uses we can see the mobile application uses rate
increase very dramatically. Before talking about mobile
application if we think about the uses of Smartphone
then we can see that the uses of smartphone increase
very rapidly. According to Wireless Expertise Ltd,
Market Report [14], in 2008, the global smartphone
sales was 140 million, and the number of smartphones
sold per year will be 422.96 million. Wireless Expertise
expresses that by 2013 smartphone penetration will be
approaching approximately 28-30% of the total mobile
market in 2013.
Fig-4: Global Smartphone sale in differ year and future (From
[14])
Those entire smartphone users are using the smart
mobile application. Now a day most of the smartphone
has WLAN/WiFi. So user can connect to Internet or
local network with high data transmission rate. In
previous mobile application uses data we can see that
maximum used applications are social communication,
map navigation, search or entertainment. But, because
of better connectivity in future the mobile application
provider are going to make application for doing
business. In near future we can get that kind of software
like desktop software for managing business, office
automation, financial management etc.
3. BUSINESS CONSEQUENCE OF MOBILE
APPLICATION
Within last few year, smartphone and mobile
application uses growth rate is so high. So the Mobile
and mobile application also has a great positive impact
on Business. There are different areas of business
where the mobile applications play an important role. In
following paragraph we have tried to discuss some
issue about business consequence of mobile application
3.1 Business of Mobile Broadband/Internet
All of the smartphone and feature phone have smart
environment and vast number of mobile application.
Most of the applications are connect people to the
world via Internet/ mobile broadband. For example,
Google map, navigation, email, entertainment,
gamming, mCommerce. So world wide mobile users
are use internet using mobile and the mobile operator
and other third party company doing business by
providing broadband internet service.
In last few year, the uses of mobile broadband rise
dramatically all over the world but not everywhere.
According to a report [5] we can see that, in Asia &
Pacific and Europe the mobile broadband has a greatest
numbers of subscriptions.
Fig-5: Uses of mobile broadband in different region (from
[5])
3.2 Mobile Application Development Business
In a year round a large number of smart phone being
sold, so mobile application development is one of
fastest growing business. The smartphone or feature
phone or portable devices are easy to change setting
and make it customize. There are programs for
Blackberry, Androide, iPhone etc. Some Specialize
development companies make user friendly software or
template which, user can customize themselves for
doing their own work like share with friend. Also those
software uses for video game or any entertainment. The
developer company charge for the software. More users
will use their software, the user will promote the
software more and the company will earn more.
There are mainly two types of Business model (store):
one is Native or on deck and another is Third party or
off deck. In one of research “Global Mobile

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Application Market (2010-2015)” [11], published that
In 2009 about 6.4 billion mobile application has been
downloaded from native and third-party application
store. In that some are free, some are paid and some are
ad-supported. In that yeas the total revenues came
around $4.5 billion with 2.5 billion download. Now the
Google, Nokia and other company entering in
application market space with news software which are
increase the usability of smartphone and mobile
application. According to their research estimates [11],
the global mobile applications market is expected to be
worth $25.0 billion in 2015.
The Wireless Expertise [14] published that, in 2013 the
global mobile app market including games will rise to
$16.60 billion.
Fig-6: Mobile Application sales revenues in different year and
future (From [14]).
The 2010 IBM Tech Trends Survey [10], conducted to
2000 IT developers and specialists acroos 87 countries
and getting response. According to the survey, 55% IT
professional expect that, mobile software application
development for devices such as iPhone and Android,
and even tablet PCs like iPad and PlayBook, will
surpass application development on all other traditional
computing platforms by 2015.
Fig-7: IBM Survey of mobile software application
development (From [10])
On the other hand, if we think from the developer or
programmer point of view we can see that
developer/programmer can earn a lot by developing the
mobile application. Because of the mobile application
development is an open market. IT people can learn the
mobile application development and can achieve
necessary skill. After that they can make mobile
application and earn money.
3.3 Mobile Application Market
Different mobile operating system has provided by
different mobile company. And for those mobile, most
of the mobile company has own mobile application
market. For example Ovi market, iPhone application
market, BlackBerry application market, Android market
etc. From those online market, mobile users can
download many useful mobile application. Some
application are free or provided by company with
handset and some user has to pay for downloading. In
every year a large number of mobile application
downloaded by mobile user. So this is a big business
sector. In this business sector mobile manufacturer
company as well as network operators or mobile
application developer companies are earning huge
amount of money. Also for downloading those software
the smartphone user are using the mobile internet. Not
only the mobile application but also the user downloads
game, music and other entertainment material.
According to a study by mobile application store
operator GetJar [15], the mobile application market will
reach $17.5 billion by 2012. By then, the number of
mobile application downloads will have also grown to
nearly 50 billion from just over 7 billion in 2009.
However, as Getjar founder and chief executive
officer Ilja Laurs made the bold prediction that "mobile
apps will eclipse the traditional desktop Internet," even
going so far as to say that "mobile devices will kill the
desktop."
Fig-8: Global mobile apps market (From [15])
According to the survey we can see that the market
mostly in Europe and North America and the market in

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Asia is growing. Seventeen percent of GetJar users
already spend more time on Internet-linked mobile
phones than they do on desktop computers, according
to Laurs.
Not only Mobile Phone application but also the mobile
devisees like iPod application are another big market.
The Mobile analysis firm Flurry on Thu, Apr 01, 2010
released and statistical date [9] for showing the impact
of the iPod on mobile application development.
According to the report 22% new applications starts
registered with the company over the past 60 days
targeted the iPod.
Fig-9: Impact of the iPod on mobile application development
(From [9]).
3.4 Business Promotion or Advertising using Mobile
application
The concept, Business promotion or advertising in
mobile application is not so old. Now a day this is
another positive impact of mobile application for
business. Mobile application publisher, distributor and
service provider are getting large revenue by providing
ads as a part of mobile application. The advantage of
advertising in mobile application depends on the
popularity of application and uses frequency of that
application.
3.5 Business using Mobile application
Here we are not talking about the business or earning
money by developing or sale mobile application, we are
talking about some specific mobile application by
which we can do business and earn money. There are
many mobile applications by which the service
providers earn al lots money every month. For example,
Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Skype and other VoIP
software etc. All over the world so many people using
those software and the providers are earning the
revenue.
If we think about the mCommerce, there are many
companies all over the world doing business by
mCommerce, by this time general user getting facilities
by this.
4. MOBILE APPLICATION’S EFFECT IN
SOCIETY FROM THE ETHICAL PERSPECTIVE
Not only individuals or business, the mobile application
also has a great effect in society. The whole society can
be facilitate using mobile application. Some issues of
social effect describe bellow.
Quick communication:
Some mobile application like Facebook, Twitter,
Messenger, Skype, Google Talk are helps the society
people for communication to each other. They can stay
in touch where the geographical distance is not a factor.
So the social relation improves and make strong. And
this is good for family, friend and society.
Save time and increase productivity:
In society or in developed country people can do their
daily work like check email, contact with business
partner from any time in bus, train, car or walk. So, no
need to wait in room or office. In this way save the time
and people can get more time to work. The manpower’s
productivity of society or country is increasing
gradually.
Improve IT infrastructure in developing country:
In developing country the uses of mobile application
improve the knowledge of people. Because, they are
accessing Internet from everywhere. As a result the IT
infrastructure improves in any developing country.
Increase Job vacancy:
The mobile application development and mobile
application business make more job vacancy in society.
So many people can get job in this field. This is also
good for society/country.
Less computer use less power consumption:
When most of the people will use mobile application
for their daily simple work and getting facility from
mobile application, the computer uses will be less as
well as the power consumption will be less.
Considerable Cost Saving:
Mobile VoIP application can help people to making
international call from his mobile. As a result the
monthly expenditure reduced.
Entertainment:
Using mobile application people in society can
entertained themselves.

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There are so many other social effect issues which all
are ethically good for the society. On the other hand
there are some bad effects of mobile application which
are not ethically good for the society. Those issues as
follows:
1. When the so many Internet based mobile
application is available to the teenager, they
are wasting time by using Facebook, skype,
YouTube etc. The young generations are in
risk when they are using internet game or other
bad application.
2. Beside the uses of mobile application most of
the people use mobile in every place like bus,
train, office, college, university. Some body
feels disturb for them.
3. Frequently use of mobile is bad for health.
5. MOBILE APPLICATION USES LIMITATION
One of the big challenges of mobile application is its
platform capability and limitation. Beside the
interesting usability of mobile application they have
some more interesting platform problems and
limitation. We are trying to discuss the limitation in
bellow.
1. Small Screen Size: In mobile platform it is
difficult or impossible to view text and
graphics like a desktop computer screen.
2. Lack of windows: In desktop we can see
many windows at a time. But in mobile
platform it is difficult.
3. Navigation: Most mobile devices do not have
mouse like pointer, so it has limited flexibility
in navigation.
4. Types of pages accessible: The mobile
platform do not support all type of file format.
5. Speed: The speed of processing and speed of
connectivity of mobile platform is slow.
6. Size of messages or email: Many device
support limited number of characters in
message or email.
7. Cost: The cost of cellphone, mobile
application and the internet bandwidth charge
is high.
6. DISCUSSION & CONCLUSION
After all the limitation of mobile environment and
mobile application, the uses and popularity of mobile
application are increasing day by day. Most of the
people are trying to use mobile device and mobile
application instead of desktop for easy task. Gradually
the uses of mobile applications are increasing
corresponding to the use of desktop applications. All of
the mobile manufactured companies and mobile
application Developer companies are increasing the
capacity, quality and functionality. So the modern
mobile applications are more capable and more usable
for the user. And the global impacts of mobile
applications are going high.
In this paper we have tried to explain the so many
things about mobile application and business with some
data from modern market. And we think this paper will
help to other for further study in the mobile application
area.
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