Henri Moissinac, head, mobile business, Facebook, said, “In countries such as Indonesia, South Africa and Kenya, more than 60 per cent of our users access Facebook from the web and mobile devices. We expect that very soon more than 50 per cent of our users in India will also be using both Facebook on the web and mobile.”
Facebook Mobile has seen tremendous growth in India. As per the Mumbai-based telecom research company Informate Mobile Intelligence, Facebook penetration went up to 27 per cent at the end of May this year as compared to 4.7 per cent in May 2009.
“Mobile users are twice as active on Facebook than those accessing from the web,” adds Moissinac.
He further says, “People today are increasingly relying on the internet for almost everything they do, from making restaurant reservations to sharing photos with their friends. Many of these actions are best taken on-the-go, so as mobile applications become more robust and reliable a greater percentage of people turn to their phones to complete tasks they once executed from their computers. ”
The applications on mobile devices remain the same, but the integration differs as per device specifications. Facebook Mobile offerings include 0.facebook.com, an operator sponsored light version of the Facebook mobile site; m.facebook.com, which is accessible from any mobile internet browser; and touch.facebook.com, for mobile devices with touchscreens.
Most of the mobile traffic to the social networking site goes to m.facebook.com and touch.facebook.com in India. Amongst its device products the Samsung widget is most popular, shares Moissinac.
Facebook is working with all major mobile phone OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) and operating systems, and has collaborated on device-specific applications such as for the iPhone Android, and BlackBerry touch devices.
For Facebook’s expansion in India, initiatives such as collaboration with telecom operators are a priority for the company, informed Moissinac. However, it intends to keep working on bringing the features from the web to mobile devices and bring the Facebook Platform to a wide range of other platforms.
Hopeful of the prospects that the roll out 3G services will offer, Moissinac said, “3G can play a huge role in enhancing the user experience, specifically since bandwidth is a huge challenge in India. While India is doing very well on the mobile front, we believe that the real action will happen once 3G makes a debut in India.”
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