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ndroid, as a mobile advertising platform, has begun to gain a strong position in the Indonesian ad market, on the back of the declining feature phone ad impressions in the country, research by independent mobile ad network Inmobi said.

Inmobi reported that the Indonesian mobile ad market grew by 99 percent to 27 billion ad impressions delivered end of May 2012 from 13.6 billion in May 2011, with Android platform showing a significant increase of 8.3 share points in ad impressions compared to the same period a year earlier.

Android now serves 9.7 percent of all impressions, and although Nokia remained at the top platforms in Indonesia with 33.4 percent share of impressions this year, it began losing shares at -0.1 percent compared to last year, Inmobi said.

“Indonesia continues to show strong growth rates as one of the most mobile-centric markets in this region. Smartphone adoption will continue to ramp up quickly — with Android leading the way — allowing brands even more creative and engaging opportunities to connect with their audiences,” said InMobi regional director and general manager for Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan Phalgun Raju in a press statement.

According to InMobi, Nokia phones owned more than a half of impressions in Indonesia with a 56 percent market share, serving over 15 billion mobile ad impressions in the quarter ending May 2012, followed by Android with 9.7 market share, RIM and Apple with 4 percent and 3 percent market share, respectively.

“The growth of Android phone users in Indonesia is backed by its affordable price, as some have the same prices as feature phones but offer much more sophisticated technology,” said Detik.com Group marketing services head Gerry Leo Nugroho Gerry on Sunday.

“For advertisers, the shift from feature phone to smartphone provide them more room for creativity to develop the advertisement strategy itself, which offers clients a better way to engage its customers,” he added.

Telkomsel head of mobile advertisement management group Nyoto Priyono said even though the current mobile advertisement in Indonesia are still dominated by advertisements for feature phone, but the global trend starts to shift platforms to smartphones, from SMS-based to application-based advertising.

“Telkomsel recorded a total of Rp 115 billion (US$12 million) in ad revenue from January to October last year, of which 80 percent came from SMS advertising due to the larger feature phone users in the country,” said Nyoto. “However, the global advertisers have to adapt with the changing platforms that starts to shift from feature phone to smartphone,” he added.

Nyoto said that the total ad expenses in Indonesia reached around Rp 80 trillion last year, of which 78 percent goes to television, with digital advertising share lower than one percent of the total ad expenses.

“Mobile advertising is the future of advertising because it can give the client the right target of the advertising and offers way to communicate with its customers,” he said. “With more advance technology in the telecommunication industry there is still room to grow for mobile advertising in this country,” he added.

Despite the rapid change in the mobile advertising platform, Gerry argued that Indonesia is still lacking in technology and faster Internet connection that hampered the advertisers to develop application-based advertisement for smartphones to increase its ad impression.

“The network infrastructure in Indonesia is not yet sufficient for sophisticated ads, unlike in developed countries. I think that is the biggest challenge,” he said. (nad)