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Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Amazon.com lead all rivals on m-commerce shopping satisfaction according to a new survey of top retail mobile sites and apps conducted by customer experience analytics firm ForeSee.

Apple’s mobile retail efforts scored 85 out of a possible 100 points in ForeSee’s study, edging past Amazon at 84 points. Dell.com is next at 78 points, followed by Netflix and eBay, which tied at 77 points each. Best Buy and Staples scored 76 points each, with Barnes & Noble, Avon, Home Depot and Victoria’s Secret knotted at 75 points. Shoppers are generally more satisfied with traditional websites than with their mobile counterparts, ForeSee reports: The 16 retailers measured in the report averaged a mobile satisfaction score of 76, compared to 79 for their corresponding websites.

Shoppers who experience high satisfaction with their m-commerce experience are 54 percent more likely to consider that retailer the next time they make a similar purchase, and twice as likely to buy from the same company’s mobile site again. “Customers use mobile apps to research and make decisions, both in-store and out, and it’s not always in the retailer’s favor,” said ForeSee mobile industry director Eric Feinberg in a prepared statement. “One proven way for retailers to hold on to customer loyalty and increase likelihood to buy is to ensure customers are satisfied across all channels.”

Thirty-four percent of online shoppers used their mobile phones to research products and 15 percent made a purchase directly from their phone, up from 11 percent last year, ForeSee reports. In addition, one in five online shoppers now access mobile phones to compare prices while shopping inside a store.

For more:
- read this release

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Openwave Systems, a mobile technology software company based in Redwood City, Calif., is considering selling its mediation and messaging businesses and has hired Jeffries and Co. to advise the company. The news sparked a 5.6 percent increase in mid-day trading, increasing its share price to $1.87.

The company’s messaging and mediation businesses made up 58 percent of Openwave’s total revenue in the fiscal first quarter, which ended in November.  Although it’s unclear what companies might be interested in purchasing Openwave’s businesses, Wedbush analyst Scott Sutherland said that it could be an appealing move for certain firms. “The messaging business could be interesting in a rollup play or for a private equity buyer, while we see the mediation business as interesting for strategic buyers,” said Sutherland in a note to Reuters.

Openwave will focus on its intellectual property initiative, which includes its portfolio of 200 patents for mobile internet and mobile devices. Sutherland told Reuters that Openwave’s patents could be valued at about $300 million.

Last year, Openwave filed lawsuits against Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Research In Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) claiming alleging the companies violated its patents.

For more:
- see this AP article
- see this Reuters article

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Mobile operators are exploring drip-casting–a process that sends multimedia content to devices at off-peak hours or by leveraging network routes with little traffic–as a potential solution to network overload concerns, Reuters reports. Verizon Wireless (NYSE:VZ) executive Shadman Zafar explains consumers would order a mobile video before they expect to watch it, enabling the carrier to gradually transmit the content to the subscriber’s device with minimal impact on the network–in turn, carriers will offer so-called smart charging options that slash or even eliminate customer fees. “The idea would be that you don’t get charged for certain data because the carrier would handle it differently,” Zafar said. Article

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Push messaging platform Urban Airship will shutter location services provider SimpleGeo’s Places, Context and Storage products on Mar. 31. Urban Airship acquired SimpleGeo in late October for a reported $3.5 million.

Urban Airship provides mobile marketing engagement services like push notifications, in-app purchases and subscriptions for customers including Yahoo, Groupon, Warner Bros. and The Weather Channel. The SimpleGeo acquisition added location and context-based services to the Urban Airship platform, and the firm is now poised to introduce new features enabling customers to target specific devices in designated regions within assigned time frames.

“In order to deliver on this aggressive vision in the shortest amount of time possible, we need to focus our product development efforts,” writes Urban Airship co-founder and CEO Scott Kveton on the firm’s blog. “So, after lots of internal discussion and customer conversations, we will wind down the availability of the current versions of Places, Context and Storage over the next few months.”

Urban Airship will migrate developer clients leveraging SimpleGeo services to open data platform Factual, with a list of additional replacements also available. In addition, Urban Airship will not charge for use of SimpleGeo solutions during the remaining availability period or for past usage to date and will offer SimpleGeo customers up to six free months of its Urban Airship Pro Plan.

For more:
- read this Urban Airship blog entry

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AT&T (NYSE:T) is teaming with USA Today to extend the operator’s Mobile Barcodes program to the paper’s pages, enabling smartphone users to more deeply interact with news and unlock offers from favorite retailers and brands.

Per terms of the AT&T/USA Today agreement, AT&T Mobile Barcodes will appear in each section of the news daily throughout the coming months, also popping up in USA Today Sports Weekly and selected special publications. Readers can access special news features and multimedia embedded in the barcodes using any QR scanning application, including the AT&T Code Scanner app, which is preloaded on many of the operator’s devices.

AT&T launched its Mobile Barcode Services program in June 2011, enabling brands to create, publish and manage their own 1D (UPC) and 2D (QR and Data Matrix) barcodes. The Mobile Barcode Services package includes the AT&T Code Management Platform, which offers a series of campaign execution tools. Brands can roll out marketing content ranging from videos to coupons to sweepstakes to mobile websites.

Close to 90 percent of marketers plan to expand their mobile efforts in 2012 according to the results of a survey commissioned by AT&T late last year. Eighty-eight percent of the 501 U.S.-based marketing executives surveyed expect their mobile marketing initiatives will grow in the year ahead, with 43 percent of respondents indicating plans to roll out mobile applications. Mobile barcodes are next at 41 percent, with 66 percent of all respondents agreeing that barcodes will drive innovation in mobile marketing this year. Marketers cite consumer demand, security and cost as the three most critical factors when considering barcodes as an element of a marketing program.

For more:
- read this release

Special Report: Are 2D barcodes worth the hype?

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Digital marketplace eBay is on pace to reach $8 billion in mobile gross merchandise volume in 2012, up from $5 billion in 2011, according to CEO John Donahoe.

Speaking at the CEA Leaders in Technology dinner at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Donahoe said downloads of eBay’s mobile apps now exceed 65 million, adding that more than 890,000 new eBay shoppers made their first eBay purchase via mobile device last year–a 113 percent increase over 2010. Last year, eBay reported users now make three eBay purchases via mobile device every second–in addition, eBay sellers now list more than 700,000 new items per week via mobile device.

Donohoe added that eBay’s PayPal division is expected to top $7 billion in mobile payment volume this year, up from $4 billion in 2011. PayPal boasts more than 104 million active users in 190 countries, with more than 8 million merchant partners. PayPal is currently trialing new mobile wallet services at select Home Depot stores, enabling consumers to pay for items at checkout via mobile device or a special PayPal card.

PayPal’s expansion into brick-and-mortar digital payment services coincides with its search for new leadership: Last week, PayPal president Scott Thompson was named CEO of Yahoo.

For more:
- read this release

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Facebook is rolling out a Comments Box plugin for mobile websites, making it easier for media sites to engage consumers on-the-go and giving users the flexibility to offer their perspectives on news wherever they read it.

The Comments Box leverages social signals to surface the highest quality comments for each user.

Over 400,000 websites have introduced the Facebook Comments social plugin, relying on the feature to improve reader interaction and drive traffic. The Comments Box leverages social signals to surface the highest quality comments for each user–comments are ordered to show users the most relevant comments from their friends and contacts, additionally spotlighting the most liked or active discussion threads. Comments marked as spam are hidden from view. The new plugin will automatically appear on the mobile version of sites incorporating the Comments Box, the social networking giant states.

Facebook now tops 800 million users worldwide, with more than 350 million users accessing the platform via mobile device each month. Nielsen reports that Facebook is now the most popular application across all mobile operating systems.

For more:
- read this Facebook + Media blog entry

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Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) is updating its signature Search application for devices running Android 2.2, 2.3 or 3.x, promising speed and performance enhancements designed to bring the application more in line with the user experience on its new Android 4.0 (a.k.a. Ice Cream Sandwich).

Highlights include an improved and simplified user interface, query suggestions grouped by type, country-specific suggestions and results for all nations with Google domains and long pressing to remove history items. The revamped Google Search is available for download from Android Market.

More than 50 percent of Android users in the U.S. access Google Search and other signature Google services like Gmail, Google Maps and YouTube every month, according to data published last month by Nielsen. Facebook is the most popular Android app, with roughly 80 percent of users nationwide accessing the social networking solution within the last 30 days.

For more:
- read this Official Google Mobile Blog entry

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The show floor of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is a dangerous place. It’s absolutely packed with people, mostly men and many of them hygienically lacking. None of them walk fast enough. The show floor is also massive. It’s outrageous. But most importantly, the CES show floor is full of electronics products of all shapes and sizes, and companies doing everything they can to bring some attention to those products. The result is a bombastic cacophony of smells, sights, sounds and foot pain that no other trade show can match. So what does it look like? Take the FierceWireless photo tour to find out. Slideshow

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Sony Entertainment Network will expand its Music Unlimited streaming service to Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhone and iPad, the company’s president Tim Schaaff announced Wednesday during a small media event at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Priced at $9.99 per month, Music Unlimited offers users access to more than 15 million songs and is currently optimized for a variety of Sony devices including the PlayStation Portable and PlayStation 3, as well as PCs and smartphones running Google’s (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android mobile operating system. In addition to unlimited track skipping and ad-free listening, Music Unlimited touts radio channels spanning multiple genres, moods and eras, syncing with subscribers’ personal libraries and automatic recommendations based on listening habits. The service now boasts more than a million active users.

Sony will roll out its free iOS application sometime during the current quarter, Schaaff said. The app will support offline caching, allowing users to listen to their playlists even when their iPhone or iPad is not connected to a wireless network. Rival services like Spotify and Rdio already offer caching functionality.

Asked how the Music Unlimited app will differ from the competition, Schaaff and Sony Network Entertainment vice president and general manager of global digital video and music services Michael Aragon said the company will leverage its international presence and retail foothold, VentureBeat reports. Sony also plans to target consumers who’ve not yet adopted a cloud music service instead of seeking to lure existing subscribers away from other platforms.

For more:
- read this VentureBeatarticle

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