The folks over at Microsoft Tag have put together a new infographic detailing the explosive growth in mobile coupons, along with some interesting usage stats and predictions.

Consider this — a full 20% of smartphone users currently acquire and redeem mobile coupons on a regular basis, with that number expected to grow to 30% by 2013.  In addition, a full 10% of ALL mobile phone users redeem mobile coupons on a regular basis, growing to 16.5% by 2013.  These are pretty powerful numbers when looking at the big picture, and even more powerful when you look at the engagement rates mobile coupons generate.

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It was announced today that mobile location-based infrastructure provider Location Labs has acquired two companies — mobile development platform Wirkle and group messaging provider Volly.

Location Labs has largely been known to provide an underlying location-based infrastructure for mobile apps, but has recently transitioned into a provider of specialized location-based services for niches such as family safety and safe driving.  Both Wirkle with its development platform and Volly with its group mobile messaging solution fit nicely with Location Labs’s future plans, making both acquisitions timely and relevant for the company.

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It was announced today that mobile analytics powerhouse Flurry has introduced Analytics 3.1 — the latest version of its popular analytics suite for mobile apps.

Version 3.0 was just launched in August, and the 3.1 update adds three unique time-based metrics to its reporting capabilities for mobile app developers.  Analytics 3.1 introduces day-parting, lifecycle and hourly stat drill-down features, allowing deep insights into app usage that were hard to come by before.  Let’s take a closer look at the new metrics . . .

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Google Wallet has been updated to include a variety of new features, an improved UI for the transaction detail screen and several bug fixes, according to the search giant.

For those unfamiliar, Google Wallet is a new service that allows users to make mobile payments from their mobile devices using Google Prepaid Cards or a Citi MasterCard.  At the moment, the service is extremely limited — only available to users rocking Sprint’s Nexus S 4G — but availability to other phones and carriers should be announced in the coming months.

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Mobile publishing and marketing provider Netbiscuits today published its latest Mobile Metrics Report in which it details the continued problem of mass fragmentation with smartphones, in addition to the lack of HTML5 adoption despite the recent hype.

The company says it processes more than 8.5 billion mobile pages and content items through its platform each month, and said that between November of 2009 and May of 2011, they averaged 2,872 unique devices requesting mobile sites through its platform.  Of these devices, a total of 10 operating system were analyzed including iOS, Android, Blackberry, Symbian, Bada, Windows Phone, Windows Mobile, WebOS, PalmOS and MeeGo.  Though Android and iOS hold the lion’s share, fragmentation is still a major issue, especially in terms of developing mobile applications for specific platforms.

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ShopKick, the mobile shopping app with a unique twist on location-based engagement, has come out with impressive numbers detailing how the startup has grown since its launch in August of last year.

ShopKick forgoes the ever-popular “checkin” concept and instead uses a proprietary signaling method.  When someone using one of ShopKick’s free mobile apps walks into a store that has integrated the ShopKick system, a signal is detected and the app subsequently delivers reward points called “kickbucks” to the user.  Kickbucks are rewarded for anything the store desires, such as simply walking into the store, or actions such as trying on clothes, scanning a product barcode and more.  These kickbucks can then be redeemed across all partner stores for gift card rewards or for Facebook Credits.  Users can also receive special discounts on specific products at partners stores like Macy’s, Best Buy or Target.

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It was announced recently that the Associated Press (AP) has debuted a new service aimed at serving up coupons within mobile apps developed by participating newspapers around the country.

Dubbed “iCircular,” the new feature began appearing in mobile apps today as part of a pilot phase of a project announced nearly a year ago by the AP that aims to boost revenue for an industry that’s quickly being replaced by digital content.  iCircular is meant to be the digital equivalent of coupons and other promotions that are inserted into the print editions of weekend newspapers. Those ads are among the most popular parts of Sunday newspapers.

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