A new market study by Parks Associates finds worldwide growth in the number of 3G subscribers will motivate service providers, under pressure to maintain customer satisfaction and build revenues, to expand on traditional voice offerings to include converged fixed-mobile services.
Their report predicts that the number of 3G subscribers will exceed 2.5 billion worldwide by 2013, with over one billion in Asia alone.
The tremendous expansion of this large service population will catalyze the development of fixed-mobile convergence (FMC), creating new service options where users can access video, audio, and community offerings via mobile devices once limited to traditional voice applications.
"Service providers have to offer personalized services that fit individual needs, instead of uniform sets of services," said Jayant Dasari, Research Analyst, Parks Associates. "Consumers rely on their mobile phones for communications and for entertainment and social networking."
Demand for personalized services will expand mobile services from traditional voice to multimedia applications. Parks Associates predicts operators will rely on femtocells to realize FMC as these devices enable them to better monetize their 3G infrastructure.
Fulfilling such needs used to be impossible because carriers' networks and business divisions operated separately. By moving voice and data to a single IP-based network, service providers can now put together the required infrastructure and associated back-office frameworks to provide truly converged services.
The report entitled "Fixed-Mobile Convergence: Consumers and Business Models" examines the current state of 3G deployments worldwide and the drivers for fixed-mobile convergence.
Their report predicts that the number of 3G subscribers will exceed 2.5 billion worldwide by 2013, with over one billion in Asia alone.
The tremendous expansion of this large service population will catalyze the development of fixed-mobile convergence (FMC), creating new service options where users can access video, audio, and community offerings via mobile devices once limited to traditional voice applications.
"Service providers have to offer personalized services that fit individual needs, instead of uniform sets of services," said Jayant Dasari, Research Analyst, Parks Associates. "Consumers rely on their mobile phones for communications and for entertainment and social networking."
Demand for personalized services will expand mobile services from traditional voice to multimedia applications. Parks Associates predicts operators will rely on femtocells to realize FMC as these devices enable them to better monetize their 3G infrastructure.
Fulfilling such needs used to be impossible because carriers' networks and business divisions operated separately. By moving voice and data to a single IP-based network, service providers can now put together the required infrastructure and associated back-office frameworks to provide truly converged services.
The report entitled "Fixed-Mobile Convergence: Consumers and Business Models" examines the current state of 3G deployments worldwide and the drivers for fixed-mobile convergence.