“One of the most significant recent innovations in mobile payments was announced in September when mFoundry teamed up with Starbucks to introduce an iPhone app called Starbucks Card Mobile. The Starbucks program, which is being field tested at 16 Starbucks locations in Seattle and Northern California, utilizes a 2D bar code system from mFoundry which enables latte drinkers and other customers of the Seattle-based chain to pay for their orders using mobile phones at the point of sale.” – Bank Technology News

Embracing Twitter, Facebook, and Delicious

In lieu of blogging, I’ve spent most of the year posting to Twitter mainly in the form of Delicious links I collect and find interesting. I’m not much of a consumer of Twitter, I still prefer to read well written blog posts vs the random dribble that most tweets are … but I must say, I’ve discovered and been discovered by some very interesting people via twitter that I would otherwise never had the chance to meet. I’ve also started to really take advantage of Facebook to find many of the people I went to high-school with.

Living in the “Rose”

Having decided that we wanted to simplify our lifestyle and live a little more adventurously, my wife and I decided to sell our home and move into an RV we affectionately call “The Rose” (pictured on the right). For many this seemed like an insane idea, but for us it has been one of the best things we’ve done for ourselves.

Death of a Giant [Westie]

On November 9th, Scotty (pictured on the right), the family “westie”, died at a ripe old age of 14 years old. He had an amazingly full life. In his 14 years, he managed to travel all over the world; living in such exotic places as Scotland (where he was born), Brazil, and Korea. He will be missed greatly and remembered most for his love of Harley motorcycles, nasty smells, and the neighbor’s mail box.

Device Divergence is Worse Than Ever

The most significant development in 2008 was the further divergence of mobile device platforms. Besides, J2ME/MIDP, Blackberry, BREW and Windows Mobile … we now have iPhone, Android, and 2 new flavors of Blackberry. We have also seen the emergence of the “touchscreen” across a number of device platforms.

I remember when Drew and I were first raising money, a common opinion was that technologies like Mojax wouldn’t have a role in the future of mobile devices because these device platforms would converge into a common platform that software would be compatible with … boy were they wrong! As near as we can tell … the problem is getting worse not better.

The “Indy” Software Publisher Lives!

The Apple App Store was another game changer. It is finally possible for a single developer or team of developers to actually make money selling software for mobile. There are more independent software publishers now than there was ever before! I find this to be the most exciting development in mobile … even more exciting than the iPhone itself (and that is saying a lot). Great software has almost always come from small teams and individuals working out of their “garages” … now these guys can do that and make a living too.

America Has a New “Mobile Savvy” President

Needless to say, I voted for Obama and was one of the millions of Americans that rejoiced when he was elected. Perhaps less news worthy, but this President and his staff understand the power and opportunity that comes from leveraging the Internet and Mobile services. His campaign and staff leveraged the Mobile and Internet channels in ways that would never have been possible even a few years ago.

“Feature” Phones Have Become Less Relevant

I’ve personally never understood why they call them “feature” phones … I’d call them “featureless” phones myself … but the J2ME/MIDP and BREW devices of this world are becoming less relevant. This is not because there aren’t a ton out there … its because people that have them are less likely to use data services or know how to download content to their device.

Our experience confirms this as well. People that have iPhones, Blackberries, and Windows Mobile devices are much more likely to use data services, browse as website, and download and application to their device than someone that owns a traditional “flip” phone. The cost of these “smart-devices” is also going down, making it possible for lower income individuals to purchase and use these devices.

Given the expense of supporting “feature” phones, I suspect that most content providers will give up trying to create new content for these devices and focus exclusively on the smartphone. I’ll go one further … I think that the iPhone will be the primary device for applications, and other “smartphones” will be supported via a mobile-optimized website.

The Economy “Tanks”

Perhaps the most significant development of 2008 was the nose-dive the economy took at the end of the year. So many of the mobile startups that I knew in 2008 are now out of business. Fortunately mFoundry was not in a position to need to raise money. We are secure for the moment, we have money in the bank, recurring revenues, and a respectable pipeline going into 2009. That said, I’m sure we’ve yet to see the end of this downturn. There will no doubt be some unpleasant surprises in 2009 that I’ve yet to imagine.

What Does the Future Hold for mFoundry?

At this point it is hard to imagine what is in store for mFoundry. We are being conservative this year in our spending so I don’t expect anything tremendously innovative from a product standpoint but rather evolutionary. We will continue to do what is working for us … mBanking … and we will make sure we are releasing the best software we can. At the end of 2009 I’d like to be able to say that we’ve got almost a hundred banks and line-of-sight to a few hundred more going into 2010. We will focus less on feature phones and instead look to provide turnkey mBanking services for the “right” devices.

Happy New Year, and best wishes to everyone!

Rodney Aiglstorfer

I’m even able to watch it on my TV via my Mac mini, which I have attached to the TV. The experience has been so positive that I’ve canceled my cable (reduced to only Broadband internet service) and haven’t looked back.

Now, if only Hulu would work on Apple TV I’d have everything I’d want. For now I’d settle for some way to control Hulu using the Apple Remote. As it stands right now I have to use my laptop and RemoteDesktop to control the Hulu interface. This isn’t that big of a deal as I can kick off my play “queue” using the laptop and kickback without having to touch it again.

Congratulations to Craig and all the Eclipse MTJ team!

Why it’s fierce: mFoundry is winning over the mobile banking market one financial institution at a time: Last year it worked with Citibank to take its services to the mobile platform and this year will bring mFoundry’s total up to 15 or 20 banks. It’s no wonder mFoundry is becoming the platform for mobile banking: Motorola and PayPal are among its investors. The startup’s partnership with PayPal puts it in position to take on the peer-to-peer money transfer market in the U.S. with carrier partners like Sprint Nextel. mFoundry is also one of the few companies in the mobile financial services sector to offer up a software development kit (SDK) for developers looking to leverage its platform.

What to look for: National Cash Registers (NCR) is another key investor for mFoundry-and one that signals the next big market for the startup: near field communications. NCR will be instrumental in helping mFoundry break into the near field communications game because NCR is one of the biggest hardware providers for point-of-sale terminals. mFoundry, however, has no plans to go for an initial public offering, but expect any company looking to compete with Qualcomm, which recently acquired mFoundry competitor Firethorn, to snap up mFoundry.

It’s official, I am now a card carrying member of the exclusive iPhone Developer Program! I just loaded my first iPhone application to my very own iPhone … W00T!

I’ve been spending a lot of time teaching myself Objective-C. The transition has been a challenge coming from the Java world. Relearning how to do things I take for granted in Java/MIDP can be frustrating at times but I must say that the iPhone SDK looks VERY promising.

Let the journey begin!