Digital Lifescapes

The impact of technology is seen in nearly every industry, and every region of the world. The Global Networked Economy is in a perpetual state of evolution. This creates both challenges and opportunities. Following the COVID-19 global pandemic, the market saw some recovery due to rising demand from remote working and the need for a connected ecosystem. Now there are new overarching issues affecting the global supply chains for many consumer electronics sectors. According to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research, these conditions have led to weaker demand, but with technical advancements in Artificial Intelligence (AI), Fifth Generation (5G) mobile connectivity, and new form factors, 2023 will be a recovery year for the consumer technology market. Consumer Technology Market Development "In smartphones, the replacement cycle followed by the migration to 5G smartphones and eagerness to embrace new form factors like foldable devices will be the main growth drivers for acce...

Wireless communications technology applications will gain new momentum in 2022. Looking ahead, wireless device connectivity innovations such as Wi-Fi 6 and Ultra-Wideband (UWB) technology adoption will accelerate new growth. According to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research, next year Wi-Fi 6 will reach over 1.5 billion annual chipset shipments, while 6 GHz enabled Wi-Fi 6E chipsets are forecasted to nearly triple. Meanwhile, Ultra-Wideband devices are expected to reach nearly half-a-billion units as adoption increases within smartphones, wearables, speakers, personal trackers, and RTLS applications. Wireless Innovation Market Development "The wireless connectivity landscape continues to evolve thanks to the emergence of new technologies, enhancements to established technologies, and continued innovation and competition across the chipset, module and device ecosystems," said Andrew Zignani, research director at ABI Research . 2022 will be a critical year for wire...

Wireless communications technology continues to transform the telecom landscape. Projected growth across the smart home, wearables, beacons, healthcare, smart cities, automotive, and commercial building automation, will help accelerate the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth share of device shipments. According to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research, Internet of Things (IoT) end markets will represent 31 percent of total Bluetooth and 27 percent of Wi-Fi device shipments in 2024 -- that's up from 13 percent and 10 percent respectively in 2018. Wireless Technology Market Development Smartphones will continue to be important markets for both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, however, when it comes to the Bluetooth shipments, the IoT market is expected to overtake the smartphone market for the first time in 2024 as its share of the market falls to less than 30 percent. Furthermore, the share of smartphones as a proportion of Wi-Fi device shipments is also set to fall below 40 percent by 202...

Wireless technologies are adding new fuel to the emerging Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) market. As an example, ultra-wideband (UWB) indoor location technology that's used for logistics apps is ready for substantial market growth. According to the latest market study by ABI Research, there's a significant emerging opportunity for the high-accuracy, low-cost ultra-wideband radio technology in industrial and IoT markets -- with total revenues to reach $15 billion by 2021. “High-precision UWB technologies are nothing new, with companies like Time Domain, Ubisense and Zebra Technologies being long-established vendors in the RTLS/asset tracking market," said Patrick Connolly, principal analyst at ABI Research . UWB Technology Market Development ABI analysts believe that while it's true that UWB is able to perform well in challenging RF environments, the cost/accuracy trade-off previously limited this technology to very niche applications. But now startups are i...

Smart home, beacon, wearable, and other nascent Internet of Things (IoT) applications -- including energy management and smart cities -- are to propel the wireless IoT connectivity market forward, according to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research. The market's trend toward multi-protocol connectivity IC adoption will ease development time, boost scale, and reduce complexity and cost for manufacturers across these different sectors in the years ahead. "2015 witnessed a growing trend toward the development of multi-protocol connectivity SoCs for the IoT, some of which support both Bluetooth Smart and 802.15.4," said Andrew Zignani, industry analyst at ABI Research . ABI analysts believe the devices that incorporate multi-protocol chipsets will stand the tests of time. While a product might utilize Bluetooth in the short term, a device manufacturer may want to switch to Thread in the future or have the ability to talk to multiple connectivity protocols onc...

Many more consumer electronics devices will become part of the typical home network, as the Internet of Things (IoT) phenomena gains momentum. Meanwhile, the desire to create intuitive home spaces continues to increase, which in turn creates opportunities for more vendors to gain a share of the smart home market. Nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of smart home product owners used a smartphone to control or monitor their home automation devices, according to the latest market study findings by The NPD Group. Additionally, 73 percent of smart home owners already use voice commands, with 61 percent of those consumers expressing an interest in wanting to use voice to control more products in their homes. Smartphone App Software Integration "This reliance on smartphones to control and monitor the smart home is due, in part, to app compatibility, as nearly all home automation devices have an iPhone or Android app,” said John Buffone, executive director at The NPD Group . NPD beli...

Wireless communication will adapt to meet the growing needs from the Internet of Things (IoT). Meanwhile, Bluetooth enabled device shipments will increase from 2.8 billion units in 2015 to more than 4.6 billion in 2020, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. More than 19 billion devices to be equipped with Bluetooth technology over the next 5 years. Smartphones will continue to represent the bulk of the Bluetooth product market, accounting for more than 45 percent of shipments in 2020. However, the shares of emerging IoT market segments -- including beacons, smart lighting, home automation and consumer robotics devices -- will increase within the next five years to collectively represent more than 20 percent of the total market by 2020. "The Bluetooth Special Interest Group, which added more than 2,800 new members this year alone, made significant enhancements to Bluetooth specifications in order to increase its viability for IoT applications," said Andre...

Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) Beacons have emerged as a major new wireless technology with a multi-billion dollar market development opportunity -- and it's a key part the emerging Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem. BLE Beacons provide a long list of next-generation uses cases in growing markets -- including indoor location proximity, in-store retail, smart home, smart city, industrial, mobile payments, wearables, mobile advertising, and ambient intelligence. BLE beacons are now ready for mainstream adoption in 2016, following a strong 2015 third quarter in shipments and new contract signings, according to the latest worldwide market study by ABI Research. Moreover, the current use cases also create significant new demand for big data storage and software analytics applications. "We populated our contract tracker with a handful of company names in the last quarter, including IKEA, H&M, Macy’s, Target, Pizza Hut, Elle, Espirit, McDonalds and Carrefour," said Patri...

Shipments of connected wearables reached 72.5 million in 2015, that's up from 25.3 million devices in the previous year, according to the latest worldwide market study by Berg Insight. Many of these devices have become a significant part of the emerging Internet of Things (IoT) phenomena. Increasing by a compound annual growth rate of 25.8 percent, total global shipments of smartwatches, smart glasses, fitness & activity trackers, people monitoring & safety devices and medical devices as well as other wearable devices are forecasted to reach 228.3 million units in 2020. Moreover, Bluetooth will remain the primary M2M wireless connectivity option in the coming years. However, a total of 17.8 million of the wearables sold in 2020 are forecasted to incorporate embedded cellular connectivity, mainly in the smartwatch and people monitoring & safety categories. Apple entered the connected wearables market in Q2-2015 and quickly became the leading smartwatch vendor. The ...

Within the mainstream marketplace, the notion of an Internet of Things (IoT) still translates into having more potential applications in the home, popularized by innovations like smart thermostats that learn from the user's personal preferences. That said, this is very much a nascent market. Smart Home devices are supposed to make life easier for the people that use them, but according to the findings from the latest market study by Argus Insights, consumer satisfaction is slowly rising while overall demand continues to decline. Connectivity has been accomplished, but future success of the smart home market will depend on how smart the products can really be -- making life better for the user, in some perceived or quantifiable way. According to the new data, distrust from consumers about the reliability of these connected devices is obstructing growth in adoption and that, along with a steady drop in demand, may lead to a challenging holiday sales season for home automation c...

As more machine-to-machine (M2M) applications are being created, Internet connectivity will become essential to numerous heavy industries around the globe. The installed base of wireless Internet of Things (IoT) devices in industrial automation reached 10.3 million in 2014, according to the latest worldwide market study by Berg Insight. The number of wireless IoT devices in automation networks is now forecast to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 27.2 percent to reach 43.5 million by 2020. There is a wide range of wireless technologies used in industrial automation with different characteristics and use cases. As an example, 802.15.4 based standards such as WirelessHART and ISA100.11a are major contenders at the field level in process automation networks. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are the most widespread technologies in factory automation while cellular connectivity typically is used for remote monitoring and backhaul communication between plants. The increasing populari...

Retailers are investing more on in-store digital technology that has the potential to improve the shopping experience. The ABI Research quarterly indoor location database has forecast well over one million indoor location retail deployments by 2020, with Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons now established as the key building block for indoor location. "What is really interesting is how rapidly beacons are spreading into all 11 retail or venue verticals covered in the database, in particular quick service restaurants (CAGR 84.4 percent) and convenience stores (CAGR 47.1 percent) are two of the fastest growing verticals over the forecast period" said Patrick Connolly, principal analyst at ABI Research . ABI has forecast some major chain-wide technology deployments over the next 12 months, and there will also be significant new growth in key retail verticals -- such as Grocery, Big Box, and Malls. Total BLE beacon shipments are now expected to approach 200 million by 2020 a...

Juniper Research believes that the next-generation smartphone -- enabled by an associated software application -- is set to become a means of linking external Smart Wireless Devices to the mobile cloud. These smartphones will form a central point for a Wireless Personal Area Network, thereby connecting to a wide range of peripheral software apps, web-based portals or cloud-based services. Put simply, a smart wireless device is a stand-alone piece of hardware which can link to a nearby smartphone, often via a short-range wireless technology such as Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. The device will typically have a companion app, which will add value to the data received from the hardware device. In addition, data from the device may be uploaded to an online site for data analysis. Juniper has unveiled their list of recent smart technology developments that they believe will positively impact the smart wireless devices sector during 2015. The Apple Watch launch is a potential game-changer. Not...

The applications for smartphones within physical retail environments already extend beyond in-store product or pricing comparisons by consumers. Moreover, the future use-cases that are likely to emerge in the coming year will expand across a variety of retail sectors. It has been a breakthrough year for indoor wireless location applications for retail, with ABI Research forecasting deployments to approach 25,000 by the end of 2014 -- that's up by more than 100 percent from 2013. "Vertically, the bulk of deployments are in clothing, big box, grocery, and shopping malls in 2014, driven by a variety of applications such as customer analytics, offers or coupons, product search, staff management, and navigation," said Patrick Connolly, senior analyst at ABI Research . Looking toward 2015, we can expect to see the quick serve restaurant (QSR) market growing with a significant demand for queue management technologies -- as illustrated by companies like Starbucks and Taco ...

Imagine a world where all manner of electrical and electronic devices are connected together via a wireless link -- that's the Internet of Everything. The installed base of active wireless connected devices will exceed 16 billion in 2014, that's about 20 percent more than in 2013, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. Moreover, the number of devices will more than double from the current level, with 40.9 billion forecast for 2020. "The driving force behind the surge in connections is that usual buzzword suspect, the Internet of Things (IoT)," said Aapo Markkanen, principal analyst at ABI Research . If we look at this year’s installed base, smartphones, tablets, PCs, and other hub devices still represent 44 percent of the active total, but by the end of 2020 their share is likely to drop to 32 percent. In other words, 75 percent of the growth between today and the end of the decade will come from non-hub devices -- such as wireless sensor nodes ...

While the broad concept of the Internet of Things may be difficult for people to grasp, one basic concept is already familiar within the mainstream population -- that being the practical benefits of GPS and location-aware technologies. Healthcare, enterprise, mobile wearables and indoor beacon applications will help to revive the global positioning system (GPS) tracking device market, with ABI Research forecasting the market to reach over $3.5 billion in 2019. The GPS personal tracking market has always had huge potential yet it has faced significant barriers around awareness, expensive devices, cellular subscriptions, indoor location and market fragmentation. As a result, market development has never been able to scale sufficiently to lower costs and create the revenue to support much needed marketing and advertising campaigns. But that's about to change. According to the latest market study by ABI Research, the upside will now be driven by the adoption of GPS applications...

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...

The Internet of Things will likely become a mainstream phenomena in a few key industries before it penetrates the whole global networked economy. Therefore, it will be important to share those early-adopter applications with others, so that more broader market development can occur over time. Infonetics Research released excerpts from its new "M2M Connections and Services by Vertical" report, which provides market size, analysis, and forecasts for machine-to-machine (M2M) connections and services by technology, vertical, and geographic region. "M2M is one of the fastest-growing major new segments for service providers," said Godfrey Chua, analyst at Infonetics Research . "We forecast global revenue from M2M services to more than double between 2012 and 2017, from just under $15 billion to $31 billion." That being said, what's often overlooked about M2M is that it will be delivered to the world by way of a portfolio of access technologies -- some ...

Remote controls for a variety of consumer electronics in the home will start to get smarter as they're being redesigned for much greater utility. The new features and capabilities will help to redefine the inherent usability and value that these devices provide. In 2013 10 percent of the remote controls shipped with major home consumer equipment will be RF-enabled. This is just the beginning of a new trend -- the quest for the ultimate remote control. Over the next five years there will be a major surge in RF technology adoption for remote controls as vendors look to differentiate their products -- driving growth in smart home services, according to the latest market study by ABI Research. While at the same time RF solutions continue to fall in price, implementations become more simplified and lower powers are achieved. "RF technology has been considered for use in remote controls for many years but its adoption has been limited by a lack of perceived need among device...

Perhaps you have seen the research that Cisco IBSG has shared about the Internet of Everything phenomenon. Others are now participating in the global market assessment, with the intent to gain a better understanding of the applications and associated upside potential. The latest data from ABI Research on the Internet of Everything (IoE) shows that there are more than 10 billion wireless connected devices in the market today -- with over 30 billion devices expected by 2020. "The emergence of standardized ultra-low power wireless technologies is one of the main enablers of the IoE, with semiconductor vendors and standards bodies at the forefront of the market push, helping to bring the IoE into reality," said Peter Cooney, practice director at ABI Research . The year 2013 is seen by many as the year of the Internet of Everything, but it will still be many years until it reaches its full potential. ABI believes that the next five years will be pivotal in its growth and ...