Digital Lifescapes

According to the latest global market study by International Data Corporation (IDC), worldwide smartphone shipments will reach a total of 1.2 billion units in 2014, marking a 23.1 percent increase from the 1.0 billion units shipped in 2013. From there, total volumes will reach 1.8 billion units in 2018, resulting in a 12.3 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2013–2018. "What makes smartphone growth so amazing is where the growth will be taking place," said Ramon Llamas, Research Manager at IDC . "Smartphone shipments will more than double between now and 2018 within key emerging markets, including India, Indonesia, and Russia. In addition, China will account for nearly a third of all smartphone shipments in 2018. These and other markets will offer multiple opportunities to vendors and carriers alike, but the key will be balancing affordability with expectations." On a worldwide basis, IDC expects the average selling price (ASP) of smartphones to re

Both basic and smart wearable bands are an emerging high growth market. A total of 2.7 million wearable bands shipped worldwide in Q1 2014, according to the latest market study by Canalys. Fitbit maintained its leadership position with nearly 50 percent market share. Fitbit continued to ship most of the units in the basic band segment. Jawbone, another basic band competitor, also grew rapidly as it expanded its international distribution after the initial launch of the UP24 in Q4. Nike’s share of basic band shipments, however, dropped to 10 percent. "The Nike+ FuelBand has frankly been outmatched on sales," said Daniel Matte, analyst at Canalys . "Its competitors’ speed, international reach, broader channel distribution, integration with other fitness communities, superior web sites and multi-platform support have proven to be major advantages." Though Nike has been reported to be canceling future FuelBand products, the company’s focus is now on making use of

Important developments in the consumer and commercial telematics arena have subtly changed the nature of the industry altogether -- particularly within the consumer telematics space. Vehicle manufacturers are taking telematics extremely seriously, as connectivity can now make or break the sale of a much more valuable item, that is, the purchase of an automobile. Global revenues from consumer and commercial telematics are forecast to reach nearly $20 billion by 2018 -- with additional soft revenues being generated from areas such as car servicing, big data enabled by telematics, and enhanced customer service offerings. These additional soft revenues will form a key part of the future Connected Cars market as they will allow automotive manufacturers to generate revenues throughout the lifetime of the vehicle, rather than just at the point of sale. Findings from a new market study by Juniper Research, however, claims that these soft revenues will still remain a major untapped revenu

Wireless communication capabilities will become embedded in more and more everyday devices over time. The resulting connectivity applications seem limitless. Moreover, the growing demand creates a huge opportunity for wireless chipset manufacturers. Annual wireless connectivity chipset shipments across Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, NFC, GPS, and ZigBee show no sign of slowing down, reaching almost nine billion annual shipments by 2019, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. Had it not been for combo chipsets and integrated platforms the number of chipsets shipped would have been even higher. Cumulative chipset shipments from 2010 through 2014 will have reached over 21 billion -- from 2015 to 2019, cumulative shipments will almost double to over 39 billion. "That is over 60 billion wireless connectivity chipsets that will have shipped over the ten year span from 2010 to 2019, driven by the emergence of new device types," said Philip Solis, research director at ABI Res

Spending on video game hardware grew 47 percent to $983 million during the first quarter of 2014, but overall total industry consumer spending on video gaming fell 1 percent to $4.6 billion compared to the same period in 2013, according to the latest market study by NPD Group. The dramatic increase in hardware sales can be attributed to the new Xbox One and PlayStation 4 and these strong year-over-year trends are likely to continue through most of 2014, according to Liam Callahan, industry analyst at NPD Group . Overall video game content revenue was down 8 percent, due to a decline in new physical format spending of 27 percent or $372 million. In contrast to the physical declines, digital format spending collectively increased by 4 percent, driven by full game downloads and DLC for consoles and portables. For the first quarter of 2014, content spending increased for used games, digital full games, DLC, and mobile with a modest increase in subscription revenue. Callahan said,

Clearly, 2014 will be a difficult time for some legacy PC manufacturers, such as HP , where sales of personal computers -- its largest area of business -- have been hurt in recent years by competition from media tablets and smartphones. Meanwhile, more European consumers will bank on their media tablets than on their mobile phones by as soon as 2016, according to the latest global market study by Forrester Research. While mobile phone banking use in Europe will grow fast -- from 42 million users in 2013 to 99 million in 2018 -- media tablet banking will grow twice as fast -- from 19 million users in 2013 to 115 million in 2018. Combined, that's more than 214 million mobile banking users. Growing tablet ownership, the increased availability of tablet banking apps, and fewer security fears among tablet users versus mobile phone users are among the key drivers behind the explosive tablet banking growth. "As customers start using their tablets and smartphones to do their b

Wi-Fi adoption within the home is now pervasive, but application usage can vary. According to the latest market study by The Diffusion Group (TDG), 74 percent of Millennials that use a home network describe their use as either 'equally' or 'primarily' media-oriented, a rate that decreases linearly with increasing age. TDG’s detailed market assessment notes that this is coincidental with the fact that young adults consume greater amounts of digital media in the home from online video sources such as Netflix -- certainly more so than their older counterparts. While the percentage of digital media-oriented network users is relatively equal among the two Millennial segments, differences do exist. For example, among Late Millennials (18-24s), 24 percent are media-centric network users, significantly higher than Early Millennials (25-34s) at 15 percent. However, hybrid use (that is, equal use of the network for media and data purposes) was selected by 58 percent of Ea

In the course of the past 5 years, the mobile phone device has transitioned from a mechanism for person-to-person communication to a multi-purpose facilitator of essential everyday activities. Making payments has been an integral part of this transition, and the emergence of the mobile wallet is a key to ongoing market development. Juniper Research has found that 1 in 5 mobile handsets will have mobile wallet functionality by 2018 -- that's compared with less than 1 in 10 at the end of 2013. Growth will be driven by two distinct wallet models. In emerging markets, SVAs (Stored Value Accounts) are increasingly enabling first time financial access for unbanked individuals. Empowered by this model, it's anticipated that there will be a surge in deployments across sub-Saharan Africa, developing Asia and Latin America. Meanwhile, Juniper believes that wallet launches across developed markets -- such as North America and Western Europe -- are increasingly expected to feature co

Massive technology-led disruption across all industries is moving everyone globally towards an Internet of Everything -- where into the 2020's, tens of millions of people will be connected by trillions of digital things and software applications. This evolution started in the 1970's that had specialized activities driven by proprietary equipment and mainframes, then increased productivity in the 1990's propelled by the advent of PC's and the internet, followed by bursts of disruption and innovation in 2010 onward -- through open-source cloud and mobility. Connected Living, according to the latest market study by Frost & Sullivan, is defined as a world in which people use many different devices to experience compelling new services that integrate video, voice, and data services to provide access and ubiquitous connectivity anytime and anywhere. "Mobility and cloud computing are two pillars of growth that has brought about significant changes in the ICT ind

Wearable technologies are not limited to consumer applications. Growing at a CAGR value of 56.1 percent over the next five years, wearable device technologies could become an integral part of enterprise mobile enablement strategies, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. The North American region will be the largest and grow at a CAGR value of 39 percent over the next five years. More interestingly, the Asia-Pacific region will become the second largest market -- outpacing Europe by 2019 with a CAGR of 90 percent. "There are cases being made for wearables in the enterprise despite the relative newness of the technology. However, which wearables are primed for enterprise usage and adoption is a more important question," said Jason McNicol senior enterprise analyst at ABI Research . Wearable technology such as smart glasses and those used for healthcare are better suited for the enterprise as corporate-liable devices. Smartwatches, on the other hand, will m

Based on forecasts for 138 countries, the number of digital TV homes will increase by more than 1 billion between 2010 and 2020 to 1.68 billion -- that's up by 185 percent, according to the latest market study by Digital TV Research . The Digital TV World Household Forecasts report estimates that the digital TV total will climb by 131 million in 2014 alone. Global digital TV penetration will reach 97.9% of television households by end-2020, that's up from 40.5 percent at end-2010 and 67.7 percent at end-2014. By 2020, 94 countries will be completely digital compared with only 12 at end-2013. About 124 countries will have more than 90 percent digital penetration by 2020. Of the 762 million digital TV homes to be added between 2013 and 2020, 258 million will come from digital cable. Primary FTA DTT -- homes taking DTT but not subscribing to cable, DTH or IPTV -- will acquire an additional 292 million. Pay IPTV will more than double to 191 million, with pay DTH up by 79 mi

There have been many attempts to define cloud computing over the years. The abstract notion of something being placed in a 'cloud' somewhere on the Internet can be puzzling. Regardless, for mainstream consumers, the cloud brings with it a level of flexibility unmatched by anything that came before it. In particular, where broadband service providers have established ecosystems of products, the cloud enables seamless interaction, which in turn has raised the bar in terms of what consumers expect from products today -- although most consumers are unaware of it, this convenience is driven by the cloud. Juniper Research forecasts that the number of unique consumers accessing cloud-based services will exceed 3.6 billion by 2018, rising from an estimated 2.4 billion in 2013. The findings from their market study highlight that an expanding group of connected services within cloud-based storage, music and games will drive consumer demand over the next five years. Streaming Mus

According to the latest market study by Canalys, 279.4 million smartphones were shipped worldwide in Q1 2014, representing growth of 29 percent over Q1 2013, but a decline of 5 percent on the seasonally strong Q4 2013. Once again, the Google Android ecosystem was the dominant force in the global marketplace. 81 percent of smartphones were Android devices, with iOS and Windows Phone accounting for 16 percent and 3 percent respectively. Samsung remained the leading vendor with a 31 percent share, ahead of Apple at 16 percent. Half of the top 10 vendors were Chinese companies: Huawei (third), Lenovo (fourth), Xiaomi (sixth), Yulong (eighth) and ZTE (ninth). China, the world’s largest smartphone market, accounted for 35 percent of shipments, substantially ahead of the U.S., which managed just 12 percent. 97.5 million smartphones shipped in China alone in Q1, though this was down 3 percent sequentially. "The Chinese market is undergoing major change and maturing quickly, with s

Worldwide Wi-Fi deployments reached a total of 4.2 million hotspots in 2013, and will continue to grow at a CAGR of 15.0 between 2013 and 2018 to exceed 10.5 million, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. Among the global Wi-Fi hotspots, 68.6 percent of Wi-Fi is in Asia-Pacific, followed by 12.3 percent in Latin America, 9.0 percent in Europe, 8.7 percent in North America, and 1.4 percent in Middle East and Africa. The number includes Wi-Fi hotspots deployed by mobile network operators and fixed-line carriers as well as third party operators. "The mobile data growth has boosted the build-out of Wi-Fi hotspots, as it is expected that the global mobile data traffic will grow to 190,000 petabytes in 2018, from 23,000 petabytes in 2013," said Marina Lu, research analyst at ABI Research . Wi-Fi helps to offload 3G and 4G mobile Internet users to Wi-Fi networks, which is a more cost-effective method for both mobile carriers and mobile service subscribers.

The growth of Over the Top (OTT) mobile messaging offerings has threatened mobile network operator revenues and the market is now at a juncture, with many questioning whether the more traditional network operators are capable of competing head-to-head with those progressive OTT messaging players. According to the latest market study by Juniper Research , revenues from Application-to-Person Short Messaging Service (A2P SMS) -- defined as messages which are sent both to and from a mobile application -- will be worth almost $60 billion by 2018, that's up from $55 billion in 2013. The reach and reliability which SMS affords organizations looking to contact customers and employees remains far greater than many other forms of communication. Secure, Reliable and Ubiquitous Messaging Juniper found that A2P SMS would see growth both in terms of traffic and revenues over the forecast period. For organisations such as financial services or ticketing providers, SMS is the most secure a

comScore released data from their latest market study, reporting key trends in the U.S. smartphone industry for March 2014. As the market for smartphone devices reaches full saturation, the focus shifts to software application growth. Once again, Google has achieved five of the top seven highest ranked smartphone apps. Apple ranked as the top smartphone manufacturer with 41.4 percent OEM market share, while Google Android led as the number one smartphone platform with 52.2 percent platform market share. Facebook ranked as the top individual smartphone app. Smartphone OEM Market Share 166 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones (68.8 percent mobile market penetration) during the three months ending in March -- that's up by 6 percent since December. Apple ranked as the top OEM with 41.4 percent of U.S. smartphone subscribers. Samsung ranked second with 27 percent market share (up 0.9 percentage points from December), followed by LG with 6.7 percent (up 0.1 percentag

Marc Andreessen's 2011 proclamation that "software is eating the world" may be intuitive to some people, while many others will be puzzled by that remark. What does that mean in reality, and why should you care? Software is getting more attention today than hardware, and for good reason. You're going to hear a lot more about "Software-Defined" everything, because it's a significant trend in the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector -- the mainstream business-related impact of virtualization will continue to reach across all sectors of the Global Networked Economy. A good example; International Data Corporation (IDC) released the latest results from their Worldwide Semiannual Software Tracker. For 2013, the worldwide software market grew 5.5 percent year over year reaching a total market size of $369 billion. This was higher than the 4.3 percent growth experienced in 2012 -- a result of the Eurozone recovery and continued above-ave

Given the recent announcement that Intel will support the launch of new high-performance low-cost Google Chrome devices, perhaps Chromebooks and associated cloud services will become the new high-growth segment of the consumer electronics industry. Meanwhile, sales of media tablets have apparently peaked. Worldwide media tablet plus 2-in-1 device shipments slipped to 50.4 million units in the first calendar quarter of 2014 (1Q14) according to the latest market study by International Data Corporation (IDC). The total represents a sequential decline of -35.7 percent from the high-volume holiday quarter and just 3.9 percent growth over the same period a year ago. The slowdown was felt across all tablet operating systems and screen sizes and likely points to an even more challenging year ahead for the product category. "The rise of large-screen phones and consumers who are holding on to their existing tablets for ever longer periods of time were both contributing factors to

Worldwide video on demand (VOD) rentals from over the top (OTT) and pay TV operators, electronic sell-through (EST), and DVD or Blu-ray disc sales are expected to increase by 40 percent from 2013 to 2019 -- growing from $30.6 billion in 2013 to over $43 billion by 2019. Physical media sales will continue its decline, while OTT VOD services and ad-based viewing take significant market share from combined physical purchases and EST, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. "New content windowing strategies, such as early VOD and EST release dates, will continue to push consumers to these distribution channels. In addition as pay-TV operators increasingly pursue OTT initiatives the consumers will further migrate to digital distribution," said Michael Inouye, senior analyst at ABI Research . Despite this trend, physical media will continue to play a significant role for many consumers, particularly for those who have extensive DVD or Blu-ray libraries, purchase

Where are the key growth opportunities for smartphones? What are the effects of the increasing division between the opportunities of maturing regions and the emerging regions? These are questions that vendors must consider as the worldwide marketplace for these devices evolves. Juniper Research estimates that the number of smartphone shipments reached 286 million in Q1 2014, representing 34 percent year-over-year growth and 1 percent quarter-over-quarter growth. Samsung accounted for 30 percent of all smartphone shipments globally, with an estimated 85 million shipments during the quarter. While the company’s market share remained broadly flat on the previous quarter, this represented a record Q1 for Samsung with a y-o-y growth in shipments of 25 percent. Meanwhile, Apple also posted its best ever first quarter -- shipping 43.7 million iPhones, representing a y-o-y growth of 17 percent. Nevertheless, Apple’s shipment volume fell by 14 percenet compared with the traditionally str

Consumer electronics sales typically get a boost during the holiday season, leaving little demand for the following quarter of the new year. The worldwide smartphone market began this year with an expected retrenchment from holiday quarter shipment volumes, but still posted a year-over-year increase in the first quarter of 2014 (1Q14). According to the the latest global market study by International Data Corporation ( IDC ), vendors shipped a total of 281.5 million smartphones worldwide, that's up 28.6 percent from the 218.8 million units in 1Q13 but down -2.8 percent from the 289.6 million units shipped in 4Q13. The results beat IDC's forecast of 267.2 million units for the first quarter of 2014 by 5.3 percent. In the worldwide mobile phone market (inclusive of smartphones), vendors shipped 448.6 million units -- that's up 3.9 percent from the 431.8 million units shipped 1Q13 but down -9.0 percent from the 492.8 million units shipped in 4Q13. This is 0.6 percent lo

The traditional video entertainment industry in developed nations had a difficult period of transition last year, as retail sales of content on DVD and Blu-ray discs was either flat or declining, and pay-TV revenues were somewhat spotty. The days of huge gains appear to be over in many of the key saturated markets. Regardless, some industry analysts remain hopeful for a market recovery. The global pay-TV subscriber base increased by a little more than 5 percent in 2013, raising the total to 901.1 million. However the average revenue per user (ARPU) dropped to $23.80 in 2013 -- from $24.10 in 2012. "In general, the pay-TV market grew both in terms of subscribers and service revenue across all pay-TV platforms. Overall pay-TV service revenue reached almost $250 billion in 2013," said Jake Saunders, vice president at ABI Research . Pay-TV ARPU in North America increased around 4 percent to $76.00 in 2013. According to legacy pay-TV operators, the growth in ARPU is due to