SAN FRANCISCO, California — Imagine if you could share a ride to save on cab fare? What if you could outsource your small, household errands or sell your seat at a game or concert to earn a profit? Or, better yet, what if — as an hourly-paid worker — you had access to unpaid wages whenever you need it?

Well, if you are in San Francisco, New York City or other tech-smart cities in the United States and elsewhere, there are mobile apps that facilitate all of that and more.

Smartphones, and even smarter applications, are fostering a new wave of innovative business models that form the emerging tech-driven sharing economy, which is currently valued at over US$100 billion and growing rapidly.

Research firm eMarketing predicts that 1.75 billion of the expected 4.55 billion mobile phone users in 2014 will use a smartphone, while more than half of the mobile users will use mobile Internet over the course of the year.

“As we maintain, the concept of the sharing economy is not new. What’s new is that there are mobile apps on smartphones that allow people to access goods and services from their peers at a cost,” explains Dr Arun Sundararajan of New York University.

And, Dr Sundararajan is right, as technology is merely allowing people to monetise age-old practices. Take for example, running small errands like house cleaning, grocery delivery and even handyman services. The days of flipping through the yellow pages or depending on volunteers are gone. Today, TaskRabbit offers one click to dozens of pairs of willing hands in your neighbourhood for a fee.

The Monkey Parking App, which compares San Francisco’s public parking situation to a jungle, allows drivers in the traffic-clogged city to sell parking space, while Pogo Seat allows subscribers to upgrade their seats, whether at a stadium or concert, or simply sell the seats for a profit. The mobile application even allows subscribers to sell the seats of others, but then the profit would be split 50/50.

Without the Uber and Lyft car-sharing platforms, and the Airbnb accommodation-sharing network, car and homeowners would have to be content with their unused capacity and a lot less income. Likewise, those in the Eat With and Feastly networks would not be able to capitalise on their culinary skills.

Into frugal living? Krrb’s app hooks you up with used and new items that their owners no longer have use for, and Tot Spot gives parents an avenue through which they can get rid of children’s clothes and other items that are merely occupying much-needed spaces in their homes.

Las Vegas’ Shift Connect literally connects people with one of its electric cars in a flash, while San Francisco’s Cargomatic allows empty truck spaces to be filled by those who need it. Want to learn a new language? Cambly’s mobile app can connect you with individuals around the world who facilitate just that. All the foregoing functions are enabled by simply tapping the screen of your smartphone.

“If you can’t do it on your smartphone, then you can’t do it,” declares Mandy Salzman of Structure Capital, a 16-month-old San Francisco-based venture capital firm that provides seed funding for start-ups in the sharing economy.

“Everybody is looking at technology to add value to what they are doing. There is no more idle time in the sharing economy,” Salzman adds.

According to Dr Charles Versaggi of Mind the Bridge in San Francisco, the mindset among players in the sharing economy and entrepreneurs in general is such that “people have always found solutions for problems and seek problems to match solutions that have already been found”.