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Google, Firefox and the Fastest-Growing Phone Company in China — What You Missed at Dive Into Mobile Yesterday

AT1T2625-LD: Dive Into Mobile — Global Edition kicked off Monday with an afternoon of interviews that touched on everything from driving directions to the future of mobile operating systems. Here’s a handful of highlights:

  1. “Firefox OS? What the f**k?” asked AllThingsD’s Walt Mossberg, kicking off the day’s first interview. Mozilla CEO Gary Kovacs said it’s all about the open Web standards that underlie the forthcoming Firefox operating system.
  2. Google may not have 44 million robotic cars on the road, but Waze has 44 million users, Waze CEO Noam Bardin said, and they make Waze’s maps better by using them. Bardin touted the power of crowdsourced driving directions, which so far have “validated” about 1.5 billion km (or about 932 million miles).
  3. Google’s Jason Spero, appearing with Millennial Media’s Mollie Spillman, said that mobile ads will have more potential once they can track user behavior for advertisers’ sake. However, Spillman added, “It’s becoming more mainstream and mandatory that mobile is part of the marketing budget or media spend.”
  4. Xiaomi sold 7.19 million handsets in 2012, and expects to sell double that number this year. The high-end smartphone company is one of China’s fastest-growing. “We believe the future of the mobile Internet is really about services,” said company president Bin Lin.
  5. Lady Gaga’s manager Troy Carter simultaneously balanced Gaga’s plans for a hybrid album-app with the fact that physical CD sales are still incredibly important in the music business: “You can’t shock the water in our business. It’s about gradual change,” he said. “You still have to cater to the market that’s out there.”

For more, please check out our full list of stories from D: Dive Into Mobile. See you tomorrow!