Skip to main content

Next-Gen Mobile Drives Handset Sales

Mobile telephone users in the developed world are adopting wireless data services in large and growing numbers, leading to a rise in sales of smartphones that support these advanced functions.

According to ABI Research analyst Shailendra Pandey, "Some of these data services are popular everywhere: think of music and ringtone downloads, or games. Others are commercially available only in certain world regions: mobile TV, for instance, is popular in Western Europe and parts of Asia, but is virtually unseen elsewhere."

The operators are doing all they can to promote such services. Both Vodafone and NTT DoCoMo, in Europe and Japan respectively, intend to launch HSDPA services during 2006.

Operators are adopting varied strategies to push next-generation services, says Pandey, depending partly on the orientation of their customer bases. In 3Q 2005, NTT DoCoMo's recently announced data services were predominantly business-focused, encompassing applications such as fleet management and workforce automation.

Vodafone, on the other hand, has been building out more consumer-centric 3G services, including agreements for providing music downloads, games, and location-based services for consumers such as child-tracking. Hutchison 3G has announced that it will be rolling out 39 new UMTS applications for location services, video surveillance, and the mobile office.

"It's too early to gauge the success of the new data services," notes Pandey, "but if smartphone sales are any guide, the signs are good: in the 3Q 2005 they were up 134 percent compared to the same quarter last year." One reason is that mobile operators are heavily subsidizing the prices of the handsets, which now cost about 25-30 percent less than they did a year ago.

Popular posts from this blog

The Quantum Computing Hybrid Reality

The rise of quantum computing has been heralded as a game-changing technological leap, promising to solve complex problems far beyond the reach of traditional powerful computers. However, it's becoming clear that the future of high-performance computing lies not in quantum alone, but in a hybrid approach that combines the strengths of quantum and classic systems. According to the latest market study by Juniper Research , there are challenges facing pure quantum computing and solutions developed to bridge the gap between its potential and realistic applications. Quantum Computing Market Development Juniper Research forecasts that quantum technology commercial revenue will grow from $2.7 billion in 2024 to $9.4 billion by 2030. This growth trajectory underscores the interest and investment in quantum technologies across various industries. The path to widespread adoption is not without obstacles. One of the most significant challenges is quantum decoherence, where systems lose their