I finally had the chance to review the 2010 mobile trends predictions from Thomas Husson, a Senior Analyst at Forrester. The report hit on a fundamental concept: mobile performed exceptionally well during the 2009 economic recession. To reflect on this, the industry has really been bullish from an M&A perspective. As the year came to an end, the M&A market began to pick up with a number of acquisitions including the now-over-hyped Google purchase of AdMob as well as the Apple acquisition of Lala (music streaming service). Thus far, 2010 has seen continued M&A activity, with emphasis on mobile advertising companies including Quattro Wireless being acquired by Apple and Ad Marvel being acquired by Opera. Larger industry players are plucking companies to secure their seat at the table to reap the profits that the mobile industry is beginning to offer maturing companies. There is also a flurry of investment activity surrounding mobile games companies (which I will leave for another post).

The 2010 Mobile Trends report offers these high level statements:

• More brands will start taking the mobile web into account in their strategies.
• Innovation in mobile payments will accelerate.
• Google will shake up the mobile navigation business.
• Location will start enabling richer mobile experiences.
• Social Computing and mobile phones will expand their love affair.
• Live mobile TV will be hyped again.
• The OS arms race will heat up.
• Application stores will continue to flourish, but none will replicate Apple’s success in 2010.
• Some operators will want to reduce their increasing dependency on Apple.

Read the Forrester blog for a deeper dive into these trends.

My $0.02 on the “Live mobile TV” Trend
If you’re a die-hard TV fan, getting live TV to your mobile phone has been around for a while from Slingbox, which allows you to stream shows from your PVR/DVR at home to a BlackBerry or iPhone. In 2010, I believe much more than live mobile TV is going to heat up in the mobile video segment. Since mobile carriers are now extending the capabilities of their networks beyond 3G, such as the multiple WiMax network deployments by Clearwire/Sprint, higher-quality mobile video finally has rails that can support its intense-bandwidth needs. This means more services that will bring consumers music videos, concerts, plays, festivals, live sporting events, tv shows (live and archived), movies (full length and in bite-sized snacks) — and my personal favourite — video-calling. I’m quietly keeping my fingers crossed that the iPhone 4G supports video calls! One last thing, mobile advertising networks will likely be the default solution to monetizing “lite” apps; as mobile video continues to build traction, watch out for hype surrounding mobile video advertising to heat up.