The m-commerce market in China has seen a tremendous growth throughout the first quarter of this year, according to the figures that have been released in a report by a company called iResearch, which is based in Beijing. This brought the Chinese m-commerce market up to an estimated $59 billion. The growth rate in that market was tremendously greater than the overall mobile shopping increase seen globally, which was a very healthy 45 percent. The iResearch figures were based on measurements of the gross merchandise volumes (GMV). The prediction that was made based on the data is that there will have been a continued …

A new report from Frost & Sullivan finds that sales of RFID readers, tags and software to the retail sector will grow from $738 million in 2014 to $5.409 billion in 2020, reflecting a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 38.9 percent. When Ram Ravi, a Frost & Sullivan electronics and security industry analyst, met with RFIDvendors at the RFID Journal LIVE! 2014 event in Orlando, Fla., he noticed that their confidence level had changed in comparison with previous conversations he had had with them. Both hardware and software companies indicated that the "tipping point" had been reached at which RFID technology use became commonplace for retailers. Ravi also carried out …

Department store chains Neiman Marcus and Nordstrom are expanding their mobile commerce capabilities as launch partners for Pinterest’s upcoming Buyable Pins feature. Available for iPhone and iPad, Buyable Pins enables consumers to purchase items they admire without leaving the Pinterest application. This enables brands to generate sales as their followers are engaging and discovering pins on the app. “At Neiman Marcus, we pride ourselves on offering exceptional merchandise and extraordinary service,” said Natalie Bowman, vice president of media, Neiman Marcus Group Services, Dallas. “Pinterest is the perfect visual playground, it’s a place where the Neiman Marcus shopper can create her own personal look …

Mondelez International is rolling out the next generation of a program responsible for driving innovation in the marketer's mobile efforts by pairing entrepreneurs and retailers to transform consumer retail initiatives. The Shopper Futures program, which is a direct follow-up to the previous Mobile Futures initiative, aims to team up Mondelez’s many brands with companies from across the nation and Canada who focus on developing mobile-enhanced solutions to bolster approaches to retail challenges. Mondelez International has long been attempting to cement its status as a leader in mobile for consumer packaged goods brands, and may further highlight its contribution to the …

Wells Fargo Advisors, a subsidiary of Wells Fargo & Co., brings conversations with clients out of the office and onto mobile as it expands its Smart2Go application. The firm has made the mobile app accessible to more than 1,000 of its financial advisors who may use their personal devices to communicate with Wells Fargo customers. Its tablet app will be made available to nearly 20 percent of its population of advisors by the end of June, proving the brand’s dedication to paving the way in financial offerings on mobile platforms.

Mobile payments are set to boom in the UK as a new report by Visa suggests that over £1.2bn will be made per week via the method by 2020.  Consumer adoption of mobile payments will grow faster than ever in the next five years, with six in ten Britons (60 per cent) expecting to use their mobile devices for payments at least once a week by 2020. According to the Mobile Money report, which surveyed over 12,000 consumers in the UK, Finland, France, Germany, Poland, and Spain (2000 from each country), one in four Brits expects to use their mobile phone to …

While Italy’s national economy is still in the doldrums, the mobile economy is a different story. Increases in mobile device and content sales, mobile data traffic, mcommerce and mobile payments are all driving rapid expansion in the Italian mobile sector, according to figures from the Osservatorio Mobile Economy del Politecnico di Milano presented at a recent conference, “Mobile Economy: la via per la digitalizzazione del Paese.” The Osservatorio reported that at the end of 2014, there were 35.0 million smartphones in use in Italy as well as 9.5 million tablets. By the end of this year, those numbers were expected to reach 40.0 million and …

Consumers who use digital coupons both shop more and spend more than the average shopper. According to the  "Digital Coupon Redeemer: Shopper Trends" report, heavy digital coupon users shop 47%  more often than the average shopper, spending $6,081 annually on groceries and household goods alone – a 114% more than the national average. "Digital coupons continue to help drive revenue for our retailers and CPG partners," said Steven Boal, president and CEO, Coupons.com. "Coupons are key to influencing shopping behavior and keeping products and brands top of mind. For retailers, the data demonstrates that shoppers who are using digital coupons are …

Starwood Hotels and Resorts is equipping event planners with a new mobile application to streamline and broaden decision-making capabilities. The “CrowdCompass” app, designed by event management platforms Cvent and PSAV, will be available for event planners around the world, reflecting the transnational nature of business. Events constitute a good portion of revenue for luxury hotel brands and reveal their properties to swaths of consumers who may end up staying as a guest in the future.

Google has introduced a new project that is geared toward enhancing the mobile security of people’s smartphones, without having to change the way that manufacturers actually produce those mobile devices. The majority of smartphones, tablets, and computers already recognize microSD cards as a type of digital storage device. However, at Google’s I/O developer conference in San Francisco, it was revealed that the company is working on a way to use that mobile technology as an upgrade to the mobile security that is already available in the device, but that makes it considerably more powerful.