Apps, China, and the Playboy Mansion

THE tail end of 2010, like the years before, was not short of predictions for the year ahead. Pick any topic - politics, showbiz, economics, technology or sports - and there was bound to be an expert ready to peek into their personalised crystal balls.

  I didn’t happen to have one at the office, so I did the next best thing. I read what others believed would happen in 2011 and chose my favourites based on three questions:

• Could it happen?
• Wouldn’t you like to see it happen? and
• Isn’t that weird?

  First, the Wall Street Journal’s prediction that applications (or Apps) for smartphones and tablets will shift towards corporate needs compared to mainly games and entertainment currently.

  “AT&T, business-software developer SAP AG and other companies are working on apps that can help their employees track sales, monitor systems or check-out customers without being tied to their stations,” the journal writes.

  Some Malaysian airlines, banks, and media houses have already launched apps for the iPhone and iPad that make it easier for consumers to use their services. More companies will likely follow in 2011, and the apps will grow in sophistication.

  Speaking of the iPhone, I also like Bloomberg columnist Matthew Lynn’s prediction that 2011 will be the year when the Apple Inc backlash starts.

  “We used to think International Business Machines Corp was sort of sinister. Then it was Microsoft Corp. But which business today has far too much power, is run by control freaks and puts profits before principles? That’s right. The world’s third-biggest company, measured by market value, is about to discover that the line between cool upstart and ugly monopolist is a very thin one,” he writes.

  One of the factors that could support this theory is the rising competition against Apple’s range of sleek products and operating system, coming from the likes of Samsung, Motorola, RIM, and Google.

  Another factor could be growing displeasure among many consumers over Apple’s exclusive (and expensive) offerings, especially when they are still burdened by the global economic slowdown and cheaper alternatives are available elsewhere.

  Where many of the world’s products are mass produced at competitive cost, though, remains China, which could start to flex some of its economic muscle in 2011.

  A former Malaysian diplomat to China I met a few weeks back lamented that in some areas, China has grown so big that two market-changing scenarios are likely to emerge.

  First, that mass production will always take priority because that’s where the money is. If you’re going to make something in China, you had better make alot of it. The downside, however, is that smaller or niche buyers will find it more and more difficult to secure supply.

  Second, as China cements its position as a major producer/supplier of parts and completed products for the world, it is only a matter of time before it starts to dictate its own terms, set standards for the industry and ultimately change market dynamics drastically.

  And finally, for the stranger predictions of 2011, I turned to the likes of Craig and James Hamilton-Parker, self-proclaimed “Britain’s best psychic couple”; and noted Toronto-based psychic Nikki.

  Between them, they claimed to had predicted the Pakistani floods, rising oil prices, Tiger Wood’s divorce and the mine disaster in Chile. My top 5 picks from their collection:

1. George Clooney will get married;
2. A gold rush will occur in Hawaii;
3. Liverpool will win the FA Cup;
4. Hillary Clinton will win the Nobel Peace Prize; and
5. The Playboy Mansion will burn down.

  Happy New Year everybody!