10 Most Read Cabana Mobile Posts of 2009

1. How Much Money Do Mobile Ad Networks Make?
2. KongZhong Got It Goin' On
3. Fish Broth: The Plot Thickens In GetFugu Investment Drama
4. If The Top 10 Generate $700mil Can Mobile Games Really Be A $5.4bil Business?
5. Palm Pre Demo From D7 Is Better Than Porn
6. Updated: Top 10 Mobile Games Publishers WW
7. MOBshop Speculation Is Red Hot
8. Update: GLUU Volume Stays High As Boards Buzz About Changyou & Other Theories
9. Will de Masi & Kranzler Finally Get Hands-On To Realize It's Potential?
10. Report: At AT&T Motricity is Jen & Amdocs is Angelina

Some Predictions For 2010

• The Nexus One and myriad other Android devices will launch with varying degrees of fanfare, but the Google devices in aggregate and the Android Market will continue to pale in the shadow of iPhone/iTunes as a consumer event due to inconsistent marketing, klugy app billing and OS fragmentation

• Mobile marketing will graduate from the experimental stage, and become a core strategy component for several enlightened global brands

• Several established mobile games publishers will either be acquired or file for bankruptcy protection... companies that could be in play during 2010 include: Hands-On Mobile, I-Play, Twistbox, Digital Chocolate and perhaps Glu Mobile

• Apple will finally strike a deal with Adobe that will allow iPhone users to access content built in Flash through the browser, creating a boon for Hulu, Vevo, YouTube, MovieClips, et al

• Apple will make eBooks and eMagazines available through iTunes for their upcoming tablet... but they will also be available for iPhone and touch

• Nokia will scrap it's Comes With Music offering, will continue to struggle to make Ovi a meaningful consumer proposition and will see declining market share as it gets squeezed by Apple, RIM and Android devices on the smartphone front and by low cost Chinese manufacturers in developing markets

• LTE & WiMax services will continue to roll out slowly, but 4G won't be a significant consumer event during 2010

• Google Googles will move beyond Android and quickly establish itself as the world's most popular augmented reality application... leaving companies like Layar & GetFugu in its dust

• The current Top 5 companies in my Cabana Mobile Entertainment Top 20 by Revenue (Zed, Index Mobile, UMG Mobile, MobiTV & Buongiorno) will all see mobile revenues decline during 2010. Smaller App-focused publishers will see the greatest revenue gains

• Carrier-based App stores will make consumers yawn, but on a positive note they'll benefit the coffers of several advertising and identity/design agencies

• An application developer, a credit card company and a major retailer will collaborate to launch the first commercial in-store mobile transaction service in the US

More to follow throughout the day...

Cabana Has Exclusive Mobile Rights To New Sony Device

Is Each Game App Rating Worth 75 Purchases?

As part of my ongoing (quixotic?) quest to create a correlation between the number of user ratings for a Paid Game App on iTunes and its downloads, I've been doing some concept testing with sources and just spent way too much time building the spreadsheet above to guesstimate the revenue generated by the top 30 best selling games in the US store from iTunes Rewind 2009. I'm beginning to get more comfortable with the idea that in general each rating is worth about 75 downloads (as opposed to 100 that I've posited previously), or in other words, that 1.33% of game App purchasers submit a review. In looking at the spreadsheet you'll notice that I've had to tweak to the download to review ratio in order keep Apple's Rewind ranking intact... and these mostly make sense to me intuitively. Basically, what this shows, is that purchasers of more casual games (e.g. Bookworm, Radgdoll Blaster) are less likely to submit a review and those that buy more gamerly titles (e.g. Zenonia, Myst) are more likely to submit one. There are two anomalies here worth noting... one which I can explain, the other I cannot. You'll notice that the revenue associated with Rock Band seems be out of sequence, however this is an App that allows in-App purchasing, so there's a revenue stream that I'm not capturing. The one I can't figure out is Sally's Spa, which in this analysis has the characteristics of a hard core game title... which doesn't make any sense. There may be a point when titles get over a certain number of ratings (this one has 16,750) that a different paradigm kicks-in. I know some of you'll be thinking that I partied too much in college (and after?) and this is all evidence of some kind of long-lasting impairment... but if that's not the case, and this model can be refined a bit further, it should be a great benchmarking tool. Let me know what you think. I'd especially love to hear feedback from peeps who weren't sleeping during statistics and, of course, from publishers.

btw - I have noticed that in some instances Apps have lost ratings from previous versions despite iTunes claiming to have ratings from all versions of the product. This is the case here with Wheel of Fortune, for which I was able to estimate all ratings from data I had collected for an earlier post.

Will Ovi 2.0 Help Nokia Catch The App Store?

Earlier today I read Stuart Dredge's extensive, candid interview with Nokia's George Linardos about the Ovi store debacle, in which the VP of Product, Media & Games was refreshingly self-deprecating and obviously keenly aware that the store has deeply disappointed consumers and mobile content publishers. “We have screens in the office with the Twitter feeds running all day long, and it’s like constantly getting punched in the face!” he says... I probably threw a few of those punches and I have to admit it's kinda satisfying to know they landed (nothing personal, George). To the extent that awareness of a problem is half the battle to finding a solution, this is good stuff. In addition, the fact Nokia is in the final stages of building an all new infrastructure for Ovi, that will replace the current tape and glue version this Spring, is positively inspiring.

This interview confirms what we've all suspected for many months... that Nokia vastly underestimated Apple's ability to rapidly establish the iTunes App Store as the benchmark of mobile content retailing. But, despite the Finn's efforts to step it up a bit with a technologically enhanced Ovi 2.0, I feel pretty confident that Apple will continue to kick Ovi's ass for the foreseeable future. The "fruit company from Cupertino" accelerated out the gate like a bullet on a rail, and shows no sign of slowing, while Nokia hobbled onto the track and is just beginning to trot. Ovi claims almost 1mil app downloads per day with a 100% monthly growth rate, but as impressive as that sounds it's gonna be a herculean task for them to meaningfully compete with the App Store beast... with its 2bil downloads lifetime and 6.6mil per day, from a catalog of 110k Apps that's getting 10k new submissions per week. And then there's Nokia's crappy (and getting crappier) footprint in the US which, frankly, will make the job so much tougher. I recognize that Nokia has dominant share in much of the world ex US, particularly in some of the fastest growing markets. But, from a practical perspective the US market is really an ideal base from which to build a digital retail empire by virtue of its population, common language, developer community and culture of consumerism. That means Nokia will have to continue to build scale the hard way, from disparate territories with their own language/cultural issues that require multiple marketing and retail strategies, that are expensive and labor intensive to execute. This model creates a negative side-effect for publishers (especially those smaller shops that have benefited Apple)... who'll need to be convinced that it makes sense to deploy apps in 20+ languages before there's any meaningful sales volume. So bonne chance with that Nokia, and if you have the chops to successfully build scale this way you can shift your agida to Apple's other huge advantage... iTunes billing.

Apple Finally Cracking Down On Bogus App Reviews

Based on a story on MobileCrunch yesterday, and a follow-up on PocketGamer today, it looks like Apple is beginning to aggressively pursue and punish publishers who engage in App puffery with fake reviews. The new poster child of this nonsense is a company that creates photo Apps called Molinker... who just had all of its 1,000+ titles pulled from the store (ouch!). According to MobileCrunch, this latest action was prompted by sleuths at the iPhoneography blog, who noticed that the vast majority of Molinker Apps reviews were posted by folks who only reviewed that company's products, and who then had the gumption to pass their findings on to Apple SVP of WW product marketing Phil Schiller. The PocketGamer story goes on to pursue a post in touchArcade alleging that Gameloft may have engaged in a similar tactic on its Modern Combat: Sandstorm title.

I presume these allegations are no great revelation to anyone who reads this blog. C'mon, the practice of self-submitted bogus reviews has been epidemic in the App Store for a long time and I think many publishers now look at this as a cost-effective component of the marketing mix (a necessary evil) to help cut through the cluttered chaos of its 110k active Apps. As a result, savvy App shoppers and insiders pride themselves on being able to distinguish between the legit and the crap iTunes reviews... but more often than not, they totally discount this feature, preferring to rely on 3rd party reviews and recommendations from friends. In the meantime, masses of unwitting consumers are getting burned by crApps that they believe have been legitimately lauded by the community... which is bad for the entire business. I'm glad Apple is finally waking up to this, and I hope they continue with aggressive crackdowns, so that the reviews component of iTunes can start to mean something again (or maybe for the first time) and become a useful decision making tool for App consumers.

Recent Mobile Tweets

So are you following me on Twitter? If not, here's a sampling of my recent tweets...

• Get some Verizagra and trade hairdo for can do http://ping.fm/uWvui Wonder if Apple will think it's funny

• PG.biz reports Nokia closing London flagship store http://bit.ly/5YVlGg Thought that was a brand not profit exercise... guess not

• likes Twitter's new preview mobile site (mobile.twitter.com)... cause you don't need an App for that

• is bullish on Layar! RT @beamadelica Augmented reality Beatles on Abbey Road crossing - nice! http://tinyurl.com/ybvjlw9

• thinks synergies, more often than not, are illusory

• 'Twas the night before Christmas and Android was shipping | People's interest in iPhone rejections were slipping... http://bit.ly/4XSWVc

• Cabana Mobile: James Lipton & LG: Don't Sext Your Junk http://bit.ly/8kjFKq

• RT @gizmodo My $62.47 Royalty Statement: How Major Labels Cook the Books with Digital Downloads http://gizmodo.com/5417318/

• What do you think of my notion that 1 review gets posted per 100 Paid iPhone App downloads? http://bit.ly/5sd9VZ

• RT @PocketGamer Is this the end for BlackBerry? Lily Allen says F You http://bit.ly/8IhSBM

James Lipton & LG: Don't Sext Your Junk

Mobile Holiday Cheer From John Szeder

'Twas the night before Christmas and Android was shipping
People's interest in iPhone rejections were slipping

AdMob was bought and Marvel was too
and the execs have finally gotten off of the GLUU

Deck managers everywhere were feeling rejected
And to social games many developers defected

Can you make more from each user? That really depends
If you can convince them to invite 20 new friends

Then post some achievements into their feed
And send gifts to their pals 'til their eyeballs all bleed

But you can play it for free, it doesn't cost money
Unless you don't want your avatar to look funny

We take PayPal and Amex and retail cards at the store
Unlock some premium levels and pay us some more

So I have this to say, in my Free Holiday Poem: Lite
Send me a nickel today, and I'll wish you Merry Christmas tonight!

~John Szeder

Top 10 Movie/TV Games For iPhone By Revenue?

Here's my stab at the Top 10 movie or TV based mobile games for iPhone and iPod touch, ranked by my latest guesstimate of the revenue that they've generated from inception to date... based on my notion that 1% of game downloaders post a review. In the spreadsheet above EAP = Estimated Average Price over the lifetime of the game on the iTunes platform, which I inferred from price movements listed on Appshopper.com. PubRev? = Publisher Revenue (caveated) which is calculated by multiplying EAP x Rvws/1% x 70% (publisher share of retail). Let me know if you think this is accurate and how well you think this model explains the performance of other iTunes App titles.

Assuming the data above is correct, it points to the value of publishers maintaining a higher price point for Apps. As you can see, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is basically tied for the most revenue with The Price Is Right despite having 43% fewer downloads than the game show title... because it's retail price has been 75% higher on average. Actually, I must say, I was pleasantly surprised to see how much price testing publishers are doing on the platform. With a couple of exceptions, the price of each title on this list has changed (up & down) more than 3 times since launch.

By the way, it looks like Montreal based Ludia, which currently is only publishing 2 Paid Apps on the platform, made a solid bet with Fremantle's The Price Is Right.

Why Can't Glu Mobile Find A CEO?

I just finished reading Stuart Dredge's timely interview, for Mobile Entertainment, with Glu Mobile's freshly appointed interim CEO & President (and current co-chair of the board) Bill Miller... and I must say that I continue to be dumbfounded, and seriously concerned by that company's inability to recruit a new leader. As you'll recall, their venerable CEO Greg Ballard announced his resignation back in July and now he's actually left the building. Miller claims to Dredge that Glu's "search process kicked off in midsummer - not traditionally a fertile period for headhunting." He's gotta be kidding, right? I can't imagine that there's been any period in recent history where there have been more available, eligible candidates on the market! There have been rumors floating around for awhile that the board is specifically looking for someone with the skillset to package the company up for sale... but, there's gotta be swarms of those characters orbiting near San Mateo. Is it simply that they're not offering a reasonable compensation package? Needless to say, Glu's investors should be asking lots of questions about how this search is being conducted and why they "weren't able to close" with the few principal candidates they've identified to date.

Unfortunately the dysfunction of this process has already wounded the company tangibly by contributing to the resignation of Jill Braff, the company's respected head of publishing, and more subtlety (but no less significantly) in terms of industry and investor confidence.... and the hurt is likely to linger in light of Miller's admission to Dredge that the company is just now beginning its 2010 planning process. And, of course, all this chaos will continue to inure to the benefit of Glu's competitors, particularly EA Mobile and Gameloft (but also, nimble smartphone-focused upstarts), that will continue to steal its market share and usurp its market opportunities. Glu Mobile needs strong, visionary and permanent leadership now!

Linktone Revenues & Net Q3 08 to Q3 09

Chinese value-added services (VAS) company Linktone (LTON) reported earnings after the US markets closed on Monday. You may notice that there's some discrepancy between the comparable Q2 2009 and Q3 2008 revenue numbers in their release and my numbers above, which are based on what most financial sites have on record. I'll reconcile these if I determine the financial sites are incorrect. Either way, China Wireless News summed it up nicely by calling the Q3 numbers "dismal". Indeed the company seems stuck in a bit of rut and it's clearly not yet seeing meaningful results from diversification into services beyond the SMS & IVR vending of graphics, tones and fortunes or their international expansion initiatives beyond China. Investors are definitely not impressed and have been punishing the stock all morning... it's been down over 20% for most of the early trading session. I think that in order for Linktone to get back in the market's good graces and provide meaningful competition to China's #1 mobile content player, KongZhong (KONG), they're really going to have to step it up in the mobile games space, broaden their offering of 3G oriented services (like their recently announced MLB video deal) and quickly prove that they can be a relevant player in new markets they're pursuing in South East Asia.

Updated: GetFugu Revenues & Net Q3 08 to Q3 09

Enhanced mobile search company GetFugu (GFGU) concedes in their latest 10-Q, filed with the SEC on 11/23/2009, that their accumulating losses and dearth of cash (less than $50k, with a burn rate of $500-$600k per month) make securing additional capital from external sources mission critical in the short-term. Failing that, these issues "raise substantial doubt about the Company’s ability to continue as a going concern." I would suggest that their prospects for obtaining those additional funds, considering their financial track record, recent investment drama, an alarming new exposé on Realtid.se and the fact that their lone product seems to have disappeared from the iTunes App Store, are about as paper-thin as expertly prepared blowfish.

UPDATE 12/1/2009: It looks like an updated version of the GetFugu Mobile Search App (v0.3.1) is now back up on iTunes, just in time to coincide with the company's oddly tardy announcement about a theatrical marketing tie-in with Summit's blockbuster film "The Twilight Saga: New Moon"... which released in the US on November 20th.

Mobile Content Scamsters On Notice

It hasn't been a good couple of weeks for shadier side of the mobile entertainment business. On Tuesday the European Commission announced the results of an 18 month investigation into 301 mobile content websites, that were allegedly targeting kids, in "direct response to hundreds of complaints coming in from parents and consumers from many different EU countries." You know the sites, the ones that promote free ringtones, graphics or games on TV and the web, that when downloaded opt unsuspecting, undiligent consumers into expensive sleeper subscriptions. 159 of the EC investigated sites had to be "corrected" (shady) and 54 of them were completely shut down (scumbags). As a result, Italian authorities have already imposed $3mil fines on a broad range of perps, including big operators like TIM, Vodafone and Wind and web-to-mobile distributors Dada.net, Zed, H3G, Zeng, Jamba and Tutto Gratis. Congratulazioni!... but unfortunately that's tantamount to 40 lashes with a post al dente spaghetti noodle if you consider the $1bil European ringtone business that these companies dominate (Zed alone claims $870mil in annual revenue). Hopefully other countries will follow with their own, stiffer, penalties.

The European announcement comes 1 week after the approval of a settlement by a judge in Cook County Chancery Court in Chicago of a series of class-action lawsuits against mBlox, 2WayTraffic, Dada.net, UPOC, Playphone, etc. that alleged unauthorized sales and billing of mobile content. Same scam, different continent. The deal struck between the plaintiffs and defendants entitles each claimant to a $10 refund from a settlement fund capped at $63mil... now that's more like it.

The really good news is that based on rhetoric from European consumer advocates and the references within the Chicago settlement, it's clear that vigilance over this unsavory sector of our industry is elevated, and that more investigations, suits, settlements and fines are imminent. It can't happen soon enough. Companies involved with these tactics have seriously harmed the perception of mobile entertainment products in the minds of many consumers, and I'll go as far to say that they meaningfully contributed to the delay of broader adoption of mobile content in the pre-iPhone era. They've also hoodwinked other stakeholders in the ecosystem, notably content owners. These distributors regularly use premium entertainment products as a lure to create subscriber revenue streams that primarily inure to their own benefit. When I was on the content side I never once saw meaningful revenue from these distributors despite often having my publishers' content prominently featured.

Just to be clear, this isn't the first time that these distributors have been the subject of regulatory, media or legal scrutiny. Frustration with these tactics reached a boiling point in the UK in mid-2005 as memorialized in this Daily Mail article... which eventually led to some firms making disclosure and cancellation protocol changes. But clearly the punitive stick brought to bear wasn't big enough to put a stop to this bait and switch crap altogether. Hopefully this next round will be and these practices, that have been shamefully tolerated within the industry for the last 10 years, will be brought to their inevitable end sooner than later.

Updated: Movie & TV Paid Game Apps For iPhone

Click on the eye chart above for a clearer image of my latest version of this list. I've sorted this iteration by the product of the number of reviews and average score. Also, I've added a CatRnk column which shows in-category ranking from Mobclix. Highlighted titles are those that are either Top 100 Paid, Games or Grossing Apps on iTunes. You'll notice some new titles and some titles that I missed (oops...thanks for the feedback!) in previous versions... notably the #1 performer "The Price is Right" from Fremantle and #2 "Star Wars: The Force Unleashed" from Lucasfilm. Please keep the feedback coming. So, based on this list, who would you say is the most successful entertainment company in terms of iPhone games?

Mandalay's Gotta Shake It's Money Maker

Mandalay Media (MNDL), the parent of mobile adult content and games companies AMV & Twistbox, reported earnings and guidance yesterday for their fiscal Q2 2010. Revenue increased more than 100% from the year ago period... but that growth is almost entirely attributable to the AMV acquisition. A look at recent consecutive quarters and company guidance to full year revenue "in excess of $40 million"... indicates the company is running super-flat. I've posted a lot about Mandalay and my lingering concerns continue to intensify. They've gotta deal with their content identity crisis. I contend that they should focus on the adult content market, which provides 87.5% of their revenue, and in which they're a major player (remember Twistbox used to be Waat Media). However, I'm not at all convinced that's the direction they're headed following the appointment of Ray Schaaf as President and their recent Hail Mary attempt to buy World Poker Tour. More immediately, they've got to deal with their deepening cash crisis... as of September 30th they've dwindled their reserves down to $2.8mil, which won't last them 6 months at current burn rates.

Is Activision Using Zombie Publisher To Relaunch Mobile Ambitions?

Activision Blizzard (ATVI) announced yesterday that they've stepped directly into the iPhone Game App publishing fray with the release of Call of Duty: World At War: ZOMBIES, based on Treyarch's uber-successful console franchise. The 3-D, multi-player, Nazi zombie killer (is zombie it's own sub-genre yet?) was built by quality UK developer Ideaworks and retails in the US for $9.99. Initial user ratings are pretty good, but there aren't enough of them yet for it to be meaningful and we'll have to wait to see what the professionals say. I think there are 2 significant things to takeaway from this release:

1) This move makes it pretty clear that Activision licensee Glu Mobile (GLUU), which just released their Call of Duty: World At War: Force Recon mobile game on other platforms, is not going to be publishing Activision titles on iPhone anytime soon. Moreover, while this may just be a toe in the water, I think it probably means that Activison Blizzard is re-ramping their mobile publishing ambitions.

2) Assuming I'm right on the point above, then its super-ironic that Activision is using the account of the mobile games publishing unit they briefly had post-merger with Vivendi Games, and summarily dismantled last year to focus on licensing. Currently, in the App Store, Call of Duty: World At War: ZOMBIES appears as a Vivendi Games Mobile title. The good news is that under that moniker COD is in great company... VGM's only other title Crash Bandicoot Nitro Kart 3D continues to rock the Top 100 more than a year after release and is one of the all-time top grossing Apps on iTunes! The bad (sad) news is that Activision's lack of foresight (or patience) resulted in their losing a high-quality global team and to the extent they are rebuilding, it will inevitably cost them much more than if they had left Vivendi Games Mobile intact.

The Mobile Hotness | India | Courtesy of Samir Bangara

The Mobile Hotness is a new series on Cabana Mobile in which leading mobile entertainment voices provide a quick summary (10 to 15 bullet points) of the latest trends they're seeing, and industry buzz they're hearing, in their part of the world or specific market segment. The inaugural post, which covers India, is courtesy of Samir Bangara, Chief Operating Officer of veteran, Mumbai-based, mobile and online games publisher Indiagames.

• Ringback Tones Are Crashing: After a couple of years of ringback subscription hyper-growth in India, reality is setting in as the regulators crack down on 'aggressive' sales techniques

• Pay-As-You-Go Data Access: Data access is now available to non-subscription customers giving operators a massive dollop of new data usage revenue… this move was a no-brainer, but it took awhile to implement

• Publisher’s Share Is Still Bad, Maybe Worse: As a result of this new data protocol, not only are revenue shares on content lopsided in favour of the operators (as they have been historically), but now the data usage charges are off-bounds for content publishers

• Data Subscriptions Are Stalling: Despite a rapidly growing overall subscriber base of 12-15mil per month, data subscribers aren't growing as rapidly, mainly due to limited network capacity pre-3G spectrum allocation

• 3G Will Lift Data: 3G spectrum licensing, expected in Jan 2010, is a watershed event that will enable networks, currently overloaded just on voice, to support more data traffic

• Per Second Billing Hurts Operators: Tata Docomo pioneered pay-as-you-go on a per-second basis in India and now regulators have mandated that all operators offer this option. This will hurt the incumbents, who were getting an estimated 40% of their gravy from 30 sec and 1 min pulse charging

• Finally, Rationalised SMS pricing: Despite falling tariffs for every other service SMS remained at the same level it was 5 years ago. Now, Tata Docomo is rewarding those who keep their texts brief by charging Rs.0.01 (.02¢) per character!

• Audio Cinema: UTV group has pioneered a rapidly growing service powered by OnMobile that allows users to HEAR abridged versions of 300 Bollywood titles for 30Rs (60¢) per 30mins

• New Operators = More Competition: At least 4 new operators will launch in India in 2009. Massive competition will lead to further price reductions in a market that is already at USD 4 ARPU and 1 cent a minute voice rate

• Ad-based Models Still Maturing: Ad-based ringback tones and ad-supported games have been tried and tested in India with very limited success. The model and the ecosystem of the content owner, operator and brand have yet to evolve

• Long-Term Content Opportunity in India is Huge: The outlook for mobile value-added services (VAS) in India is still very strong, but the last 2 quarters have been, and possibly the next 2 will be, very challenging for the entire GPRS data services ecosystem

• Billion Dollar Questions: (a) Given that at current growth rates, mobile subscribers in India will peak at 700-800mil in about 2-3 years and only then will operators need to focus on value-added content services to grow revenues & margins... how many incumbent publishers in India will survive until that day arrives? (b) Will the ad-based model, which intuitively seems apt for India, ever become viable and provide a real alternative to the ever diminishing wallet of the pre-paid consumer?

Cabana Mobile Entertainment Top 20 by Revenue

€/$=1.4849

? = best estimate

KongZhong Got It Goin' On

I've done a bunch of posts about Chinese mobile content kingpin KongZhong (KONG) in the past, so I'm not going to rehash what they do... but, generally you should know, I'm a big fan of this company, with the caveat that I've had lingering concerns that their success is unduly reliant on staying in the good graces of China Mobile. Based on their Q3 earnings conference call, earlier this evening, I feel confident that the company is keenly aware of this and that they're taking all the right moves to mitigate that situation. Currently, the fastest growing (246% y-o-y) sector of KongZhong's revenue mix (23.4% or $8.2mil in Q3) is coming from their catalog of 400 mobile games, which are distributed through multiple channels. Only 33% of their downloadable game revenue is billed through China Mobile, the rest comes equally from handset manufacturer and off-deck WAP channels (including their own Kong.net portal). The company is forecasting revenues of between $37-$38mil for Q4 and they believe mobile games will continue to be the revenue driver. They also mentioned that they are beginning to see real revenues from freemium (try & buy) and virtual goods billing models for games. I think these guys are firing on all cylinders, and given that they are the smartest and strongest player with the most cash ($135mil) in one of the fastest growing mobile markets in the world, I think KongZhong has the potential (within the next 3 years) to be the biggest mobile entertainment company in the world. Someone owes me a drink when that happens.