Mobile Insights is delivered first thing every morning exclusively to BI Intelligence subscribers. Editor's note: We will not publish Insights on January 1. Happy holidays from the team at Business Insider Intelligence!
READY, SET, DOWNLOAD: Christmas time means lots of brand new devices being fired up for the first time after consumers unwrap their gifts. For the most part, these new devices are typically not pre-loaded with the average consumer's favorite apps: Netflix, Facebook, Candy Crush, et al.
But it's also a chance for users to peruse app stores for entirely new apps. More app downloads happen on Christmas Day than any other day in the calendar year. According to data from Flurry, app downloads on Christmas Day in 2012 were more than double the average daily downloads between December 1st through the 20th that year. This is a great opportunity for the makers of popular apps like the ones listed above. It could also help an independent app developer gain a huge crop of new users in just one day.
COST-PER-INSTALL SOARS: In the way that massive retail outlets spend millions to promote for Black Friday, app developers also boost marketing expenses for Christmas Day in hopes that their app gets noticed by the millions of new device owners. But, because all of this spending is put into advertising, the average cost-per-app-install creeps up while average revenue per user remains relatively flat. Meaning, app developers recoup less of the money spent to generate that one app install.
On the bright side, a download-heavy Christmas Day means a developer will have a sizeable audience to convert into users willing to spend money on in-app purchases, instead of casual users. (Quartz)
In other news...
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: Chetan Sharma's 2013, the year in mobile. Some great analysis about consumer data usage, the rise of LTE and Android, and the fading star of once-powerful device brands like Nokia.
Mobile Marketer's top 10 mobile ad campaigns of the year include efforts from Fiat, Macy's, and Campbell Soup Company. (Mobile Marketer)
After striking a deal to unload some future handset manufacturing on Foxconn, BlackBerry also announced that weak handset sales forced the company to put two new major smartphone launches on the back burner. (Wall Street Journal)
Bullish days ... Wall Street was happy about the China Mobile deal and has been pushing up the price of Apple's stock lately - The stock of mobile-centric social networks like Facebook and Twitter have been doing well, too.
IMMINENT CONSOLIDATION: SoftBank, majority owner of the third-largest U.S. carrier in Sprint, is inching closer to acquiring a majority stake in the fourth-largest U.S. carrier, T-Mobile. (Yahoo Finance)
Struggling PC manufacturer HP is looking to finally crack the mobile market after multiple missteps. The company says it will launch a few low-cost phablet devices in emerging markets in 2014. (GigaOm)
"DID SOMEBODY SAY CHINA?" Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer HTC also struggled through 2013 with dwindling handset sales, which led to its global smartphone manufacturer market share falling to under 5%. With its next lineup of smartphones, the successors to the well-reviewed HTC One, Ralph Jennings at Forbes feels HTC should focus its efforts on China for growth. (Forbes)
PRIVACY/ANONYMITY LOOPHOLES - Stanford researchers have found that connecting supposedly anonymous metadata with individual users is actually quite simple. (Threatpost)
Data land grab: Microsoft has acquired more land to the tune of 200 acres and is building yet another new, massive data center in Washington State.