Instagram has 150 million active monthly users

"Today we’re excited to announce that Instagram has grown to a community of more than 150 million people capturing and sharing moments every month.
Whether it’s documenting protests in Egypt, sharing the trip of a lifetime across the United States or snapping #petselfiez, this community continues to surprise us every day with your creativity, sense of adventure and unique perspectives on the world.
As the community continues to grow, it’s becoming more global too — now more than 60% of you are from outside the United States. Whether you’re in Moscow or Hong Kong, Berlin or Reykjavik, we’re more committed than ever to bringing you the best Instagram experience possible.
To the 50 million of you who’ve joined in the last six months, welcome. And from our team to all 150 million of you, thank you for making Instagram great. We can’t wait to see what you’ll create next."
Source:  Blog post by Instagram, 8th September 2013
Earlier - 130 million announced on 21st June 2013

Buzzfeed has 85 milion monthly visitors and is profitable

"BuzzFeed reached record traffic of 85 million unique visitors in August. We are 3X bigger than we were just one year ago, 8X bigger than we were two years ago, and we have served more web pages so far in 2013 than we have in the entire previous five year history of the company. By this time next year we should be one of the biggest sites on the web.
[...]
Part of our strategy is being a great business. This sounds strange as a strategic goal, isn’t that obvious? But we are in a market where many traditional publishers are run at a loss by wealthy families and many high profile venture-backed startups generate no or little revenue. Surprisingly it is contrarian that we are running BuzzFeed as a profitable business. Jon’s incredible success turning BuzzFeed into a great business in just three years has been the reason why we've been able to hire so many other talented new people. So don’t forget to thank Jon for your job if you joined BuzzFeed within the last 3 years. ;)"

Source:  Memo from Founder and CEO Jonah Peretti, 4th September 2013

Amazon sells more online in the US than the next 12 biggest competitors combined

"Amazon.com Inc. sells more online [in the US] than its next 12 biggest competitors combined, including Staples Inc. and Wal-Mart, according to the trade publication Internet Retailer. Despite its greater online scale, Amazon continues to grow quickly and command a hefty share of new Internet sales. Its 30% increase in North American sales in the second quarter outstripped the overall e-commerce market and some competitors as well.
Source:  WSJ, 27th August 2013

Foxconn assembles an estimated 40% of the world's consumer electronics

"Foxconn Technology has dozens of facilities in Asia and Eastern Europe, and in Mexico and Brazil, and it assembles an estimated 40 percent of the world’s consumer electronics for customers like Amazon, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola, Nintendo, Nokia, Samsung and Sony."
Source:  New York Times, 22nd January 2013

23% of UK online purchases are made on mobile devices

"The percentage of online sales completed through a mobile device (smartphones and tablets) has doubled in the space of a year, according to figures from IMRG and Capgemini.
In Q2 of 2012 the percentage stood at 11.6 per cent, but by Q2 of 2013 it had exactly doubled to 23.2 per cent. Over the same period the percentage of online retail site visits through mobile devices has also shot up sharply, from 21.1 per cent in Q2 2012 to 34 per cent in Q3 2013.
IMRG and Capgemini have been tracking sales through mobile devices for over three years, during which time its penetration of online sales has grown by more than 2,000 per cent, with the penetration of online retail visits via mobile devices growing by 1,100 per cent."
Source:  Retail Gazette,3rd September 2013

Note - It doesn't explicitly say that they are UK sales, but I'm assuming that they are

5.2 billion cans of Red Bull were sold in 2012

"According to the private company, it sold 5.2 billion cans worldwide last year, a 13% increase over the year prior. In the U.S., sales jumped 17%, while markets as varied as South Africa, Japan, Saudi Arabia, France and Germany also saw double-digit sales gains."

Source:  AdAge, 3rd September 2013

The demographics of Wonga customers in the UK

Click to enlarge

Source:  Wonga, retrieved 3rd September 2013
Also - Wonga has more than a million customers

TV viewing on other devices accounts for only 1.5% of total viewing in the UK

"Analysis of UK TV viewing figures for the first half of 2013 shows how people’s TV diet is developing as on-demand TV viewing becomes a more established part of people’s lives.
According to Thinkbox, the marketing body for commercial TV in the UK, total average daily TV viewing in the UK during January-June 2013 was 4 hours, 1 minute a day per person.
This comprised:
3 hours, 58 minutes a day of linear TV on a TV set. This is 3 minutes a day less than the same period last year (source: Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board [BARB]). One reason for the slight drop is the improving economy.
3 minutes, 30 seconds a day via devices such as tablets, smartphones and laptops (or just over 3 half-hour TV shows a month). This is mostly on-demand but some live streams (source: figures supplied by UK broadcasters to Thinkbox).
In total, viewing on non-TV set devices via established services such as ITV Player, Sky Go, 4OD and BBC iPlayer, and new services such as Dave On-demand, accounted for 1.5 per cent of overall TV viewing during the first half of 2013. This is a slight increase on the full year figure for 2012, when it accounted for 1.2 per cent."

Source:  Advanced Television, 23rd August 2013

It took telephones 104 years to connect 300m people; it took Skype 10 years

Click to enlarge

Source:  Blog post by Skype on their tenth birthday, 28th August 2013
Note - Of course lots of other people have done it in less than ten years - WeChat, for example

A third of visitors to US ecommerce sites come only via mobile or tablets

"Out of Every 3 Monthly Visitors to the Average Digital Retailer Website Comes Exclusively on Mobile Platforms
Not only is Retail one of the highest penetration activities across all digital media platforms today, but in June it actually had a higher penetration within smartphones (90%) and tablets (91%) than on desktop computers (78%). Given its relative importance on mobile platforms, retailers should not be surprised then to see an increasingly meaningful percentage of their digital visitors being sourced from smartphones and tablets.
What may be surprising to retailers, however, is that for many consumers mobile is the only channel through which they engage with a retail brand during the course of a typical month. A recent comScore analysis reveals that an average of 35 percent of the average Top 50 retailers’ monthly audience comes exclusively from mobile platforms. What this means is that retailers who do not (at a minimum) optimize their mobile browsing experience or introduce mobile apps are effectively turning away a third of their potential customers."

Source:  comScore, 27th August 2013

Note - I think that 'mobile' includes tablets

Micromax has a 22% share of India's smartphone market

"India’s currency may be floundering but its smartphone market is on fire—sales have nearly tripled in the last year, led by the local upstart Micromax, which is nipping at the heels of Samsung for market share dominance. Micromax now commands a 22% market share, up from 18.8% in the first quarter. Samsung’s share has slipped to 26% from 32.7%."
Source:  Data from IDC, reported by Quartz, 30th August 2013

Microsoft bought Nokia's mobile phone business for $7.2 billion

"Microsoft has agreed a deal to buy Nokia's mobile phone business for 5.4bn euros ($7.2bn; £4.6bn).
Nokia will also license its patents and mapping services to Microsoft. Nokia shares jumped 45% on news of the deal.
The purchase is set to be completed in early 2014, when about 32,000 Nokia employees will transfer to Microsoft."

Source:  BBC News, 3rd September 2013