The growth of the weather category in the mobile industry

The mobile industry has seen explosive growth like no other technology over the past four decades. The invention of the iPhone, Android, and their marketplaces were the catalysts that have forever changed how people access and consume information. Smartphone users expect a "location aware" experience, access to data on various websites, a social experience, and ease of use.

In terms of user reach, weather data and weather search were the most popular content categories for 2009 with social the leading category in 2010. The Weather Channel has provided successfully personalized weather information in an engaging manner across all smart phones, feature phones and tablet platforms with applications, the mobile web, video, and messaging since 1999.

This paper briefly looks at the progression of weather data products within The Weather Channel with a primary focus on what we are doing today with a glimpse into what the next year may bring. With the exponential change of this industry, new products and technologies that were groundbreaking in the summer of 2010, when this abstract was written, are most likely out of date with new ones emerging almost continuously.

The weather content category within the mobile platform has tremendous room for growth in the US as well as internationally over the next several years with many different niche categories to be filled.