Globally, operators can expect to see the level of revenues contributed by data traffic to rise from 12 percent in 2005 to 18 percent in 2010, according to Mobile Content and Services, a new report from Informa Telecoms and Media -- "Currently, the global market for mobile data services and content is worth in excess of $71 billion. Operators have seen steadily declining voice revenues year on year caused by an increasingly competitive marketplace, coupled with an increasingly demanding subscriber base. It is expected that over the next five years this decline in voice ARPU will be offset somewhat by data revenues as operators finally start to realise the potential of the huge investments they made in mobile data networks. Person to person messaging currently represents the largest proportion of an operator�s data revenues, and by 2010 will contribute in excess of $87 billion to the their coffers."
Few technology sectors sit as close to the center of gravity in today's artificial intelligence (AI) economy as semiconductor manufacturing. Every AI chip that trains a frontier model, every GPU that powers a data center inference workload, and every power management IC that keeps hyperscaler facilities running traces its origins back to the global Foundry ecosystem. IDC's latest market study throws that reality into sharp relief, projecting that the broadly defined Foundry 2.0 market will surpass $360 billion in 2026, a 17 percent year-over-year gain that would have seemed optimistic even two years ago. For anyone advising boards or investment committees on technology and AI infrastructure strategy, this growth trajectory demands careful consideration. Foundry 2.0 Market Development The umbrella term covers four distinct verticals: pure-play foundry, non-memory integrated device manufacturer (IDM) production, outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT), and photomask fab...