The Scary Truth About Mobile Entrepreneurship

With One Week KC nearly wrapping up, the still-dedicated entrepreneurs headed over to Union Station Monday, June 25^th, to hear a panel of speakers discuss one of the hottest topics in entrepreneurship—the mobile world of startups.  Panelists shared some great insight about the limitations of the mobile industry and how to overcome them.

The scary truth: we’re running out of data

Allison Remsen of Mobile Future, a company located in the politically-charged D.C. area, discussed one of the big barriers to mobile entrepreneurship in the future—the probability of the mobile spectrum maxing out.  With as many mobile users as there are today (more than the U.S. population!), all of the data being transferred has to slow down at some point. This could take a toll on anybody’s mobile experience by the end of next year! Luckily, policymakers and businesses are becoming more and more aware of this problem; they’re eagerly working to create more data so that those entrepreneurs who rely on this technology can keep their businesses running smoothly. 

Internet for everyone

Toby Rush, founder and CEO of EyeVerify, mentioned another limitation of the mobile business world—inot having “ubiquitous broadband access.”  As coverage expands into more rural areas (like surrounding KC), it will encourage growth of the industry as well.  In his opinion, smartphones have impacted society even more so than the Internet because they allow the of information travel to be nearly instantaneous, meaning that everyone should have access these powerful tools.

Apps are the future of small businesses, and KC needs more developers!

Kansas State Representative Mike Burgess said his main concern was the lack of IT professionals in America.  He’d love to see more programming classes at the high school level, and the others agreed that more incentives for women to go into the career field are necessary as well.  These coders need hands-on experience, so more businesses should take on IT interns in order to help the industry flourish.

Key takeaways?  We need to be aware that we are nearing a data crisis and it will take young software engineers (and their mentors) to help up maintain the mobile scene.  Trust me when I say Kansas City (and the nation) will thank us for it!