Investors show caution in light of lackluster results in mobile space

Once upon a time, Silicon Valley investors had been all too eager to dump money into any online start-up or mobile company that showed some semblance of promise. Now, however, these investors are being increasingly stingy with their money, and for good reason. Investors lost a great deal of hope in the online and mobile sectors due to Facebook’s lackluster stock results when the company went public. The decline of Groupon and the Zynga’s fall from grace have not done much to placate the concerns of investors.

Online and mobile start-ups losing favor with investors

Investors seem to have taken note of the large number of online and mobile start-ups that fail to deliver on their ambitious promises. Investors had been eager to invest in promising ventures because of a desire to not miss the next big thing, especially in the mobile space. These ventures, some of which were launched several years ago, were able to capture the support of investors, but those that remain active have yet to produce any kind of return to these investors.

Study shows more than 1,000 ventures will lose funding this year

CB Insights, a market research firm, recently analyzed some 4,000 start-up e-commerce ventures that were launched and received funding from investors in 2009. The firm discovered that over 1,000 of these start-ups would not be receiving any further funding from their investors this year. The firm notes that approximately $1 billion in angel investments will disappear from this particular sector this year, as investors become much more cautious of the online and mobile ventures they choose to support.

E-commerce platforms likely to see significant hit this year

Internet start-ups are expected to face a problematic year in terms of investments. E-commerce businesses that have not already established themselves are likely to crumble as they see the funding they heavily rely upon disappear. Such ventures require significant investments in order to reach consumers. Without these investments, e-commerce platforms are little more than dysfunctional websites with dysfunctional services.

Many companies are adopting this close range connectivity tech for new and surprising reasons.

Although NFC technology has been receiving the largest amount of attention due to the many massive attempts being made to introduce it to the mobile payments sphere, companies are also finding a number of other unique and helpful uses.

In fact, it is expected that payments may end up being one of the lesser uses.

At a recent large electronics show, several companies – including the event itself – applied NFC technology in a range of different ways. These chips were unveiled in numerous devices and were used for many different purposes. According to the Broadcom CEO, Scott McGregor, “NFC really simplifies things.” His company is a chipmaker that sees considerable value in this tech. He added that “The most advanced technology is stifled if it’s not easy to use. … NFC plays a very valuable role in simplifying user interfaces for consumer products.”

NFC technology is now being used for everything from payments to coupons, tickets, press releases and other data exchanges.

While the focus is primarily placed on mobile payments through NFC technology that would allow smartphones to be used at a point of sale in order to complete a purchase by tapping the device against a reader, the world isn’t quite there yet. It is still quite rare for point of sale terminals to be equipped with readers, which significantly limits the use of the chips, even among those who would be interested and have enabled smartphones.

However, recently, new consumer electronics are being launched that include NFC technology for whole new reasons. Enabled devices aren’t just smartphones anymore. Instead, they include televisions, speakers, refrigerators, cameras, and even business cards. Panasonic, for example, has added a chip to its rice cookers.

This is considerably expanding the possibilities connected with NFC technology. Clearly, it is not simply a one trick pony, and electronics companies are taking it seriously. Though many still expect that it will soon experience explosive use through smartphones, it is evident that device manufacturers of all kinds intend to try to take advantage of its benefits in many new and exciting ways.