More than 1.4 billion mobile messages are expected to be delivered nationwide on Inauguration Day, Jan. 20, according to VeriSign.

Based on the continued rise in mobile messaging, the historic nature of the Inaugural Address and President-elect Barack Obama's ties to heavy users of messaging technology, VeriSign expects the Election Day record of 803 million messages carried on its network that was set on Nov. 4, 2008, to fall handily.

"Mobile messaging is becoming more and more popular," said Michael Campbell, senior vice president of worldwide sales and marketing for VeriSign Messaging and Mobile Media, Mountain View, CA. "We're seeing more and more people using SMS and MMS as a way to communicate on a daily basis, and we see a surge around these bigger events.

"Obama including text messaging as such an integral part of his campaign and actively involving people of all ages and all races is the pinnacle of success for mobile messaging," he said. "Obama has encouraged more and more people to use SMS who weren't using it before."

VeriSign's prediction of a record-setting day is according to estimates based on industry analysts and calculated by the messaging and mobile media division of VeriSign.

VeriSign estimates that mobile messaging will increase by approximately 15 percent on the day that Mr. Obama and Vice President-elect Joe Biden take the oath of office and then the new president addresses the nation for the first time.

"We're happy the President-elect is embracing mobile so much, and we're looking forward to more creative ideas during his tenure as president," Mr. Campbell said. "We feel very strongly that he did a really nice job adding mobile to his overall mix to deliver his message of change.

"Everybody is moving around a lot quicker, doing things on the go, and they want information readily available to them," he said. "We agree with Obama that mobile is an even faster way to deliver that information and have that info be targeted to the end user.

"Obama did good job of using mobile and he'll continue to use it."

VeriSign claims that messaging numbers are continuously on the rise.

Based on its recent New Year's Eve experience, when the company managed a single-hour record of more than 82 million mobile messages as the clock struck midnight in the Eastern time zone, VeriSign claims that it is more than capable of handling the increased traffic volume on Tuesday.

VeriSign releases a quarterly Mobile Messaging Index that summarizes total traffic volume by measuring the number of A2P/P2P mobile messages -- SMS and MMS -- that the company handles each day.

VeriSign's fourth-quarter 2008 and year-end 2008 Mobile Messaging Index is expected in February.

Mobile subscribers have pledged more than $190,000 since September to the American Red Cross through its text message program powered by VeriSign (see story).

VeriSign has helped PayPal add an SMS Security Key, a new way for members to increase the security of their PayPal account using their mobile phone (see story).

Sprint and VeriSign Messaging and Mobile Media have partnered on an enhancement to Sprint Picture Mail (see story).

Specializing in mobile messaging, mobile banking and mobile content delivery, VeriSign offers a portfolio of mobile infrastructure and delivery services.

VeriSign's clients are mobile operators, media content providers and enterprises.

"I do think that all of the major carriers are going to be prepared for Inauguration Day -- they've gotten themselves ready," Mr. Campbell said. "The biggest challenge is that there will be a lot of people in a very small area that are going to want to communicate using their handsets about the same time.

"The geographic proximity of folks trying to get messages out at the same time will be a challenge, but they've been bringing in extra cell towers," he said. "The scalability and reliability built into our network will handle it."

VeriSign expects that the results that Mr. Obama's campaign achieved using the mobile channel will inspire more brands to take advantage of the mobile medium.

"Mobile marketing is a very powerful way for brands to communicate with their customers in a cost-effective, customized manner," Mr. Campbell said. "It lets brands send out information to the right people at the right time, and as the technology gets better and we're able to do more things around location-based services, you'll see it increase even faster.

"Our message to brands, enterprises and elected officials is that people want to communicate using the device they're carrying with them all the time, and it will continue to increase," he said. "Mobile is a very powerful channel that brands should add to their mix.

"Over the next few years we'll keep on coming up with new ways of using mobile that nobody's even thought of yet."