Digital Lifescapes

Mobile network operators and internet service providers have a significant new upside opportunity. The global market for mobile Location-Based Services (LBS) will demonstrate solid growth in the next few years, according to the latest market study by Berg Insight. Berg believes that LBS related revenues will to increase from €10.3 billion in 2014 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22.5 percent to reach €34.8 billion in 2020. "The increase in usage of LBS has resulted in significant revenue growth, especially for leading players such as Google, Facebook, Baidu, Tencent, Twitter and Yahoo," said André Malm, senior analyst, Berg Insight . Together, these companies accounted for an estimated 60 percent of the total global LBS revenues in 2014. The market development outlook includes the established leaders continuing to gain momentum. The social networking and entertainment category -- comprising services like mobile social media, messaging apps and games -- is no...

What if mobile applications like Google Maps could provide insight about the inside of large public buildings and other big structures? Would independent software developers find new and interesting ways to tap this data in their smartphone apps?  While there won't be an immediate surge in indoor location-enabled handsets and applications, it's now anticipated that the ecosystem necessary to drive mass adoption of indoor location applications will be in place by 2016. According to the latest market study by ABI Research, the future adoption of a variety of indoor location and proximity related technologies or hybrids are being considered across a range of different application categories -- such as retail, navigation, enterprise, personal tracking and social. Meanwhile, these apps are also expected to enhance mobile enhanced services such as advertising, ambient intelligence, augmented reality, photography, and local search. Even at this early stage, it is already clear...

The media tablet and digital camera markets are forecast to be the next high growth driver for location based services (LBS) and global positioning system (GPS) integrated circuits (ICs) -- despite the relatively slow growth to date. The latest market study by ABI Research resulted in an updated forecast for the evolving application of LBS and how it will affect the adoption of location-related technologies. So far, the tablet market has been somewhat led by Apple and its GPS/Modem strategy. GPS shipments are forecast to reach 37 million in 2012, yet that is still much less than had been previously anticipated. There has been mixed progress of late, with the launch of the Google Nexus 7 and the Apple iPad mini. Wi-Fi location technology is a standard feature across all media tablets. But while it is complementary, it does sometimes act as a barrier to GPS integration. "When we look at the adoption of applications on tablets, it is forecast to largely mirror that of smartph...

eMarketer reports that consumers are increasingly using GPS-enabled mobile devices to find local businesses, one another and even their family pets. Apparently, this is all part of the growing upside market opportunity. Gartner is predicting huge gains for mobile location-based services (LBS) in 2009. The market research firm estimates that total LBS subscribers will more than double worldwide this year -- to 95.7 million. "The LBS industry has matured rapidly in recent months through a mixture of consolidation, improved price/performance of the enabling technologies and compelling location applications," said Annette Zimmermann, analyst at Gartner. Worldwide revenues from consumer location-based services were under $1 billion in 2008, but Gartner projects they will top $2.2 billion this year. North America's share will be the largest, at $713.7 million. Subscriber growth will hinge on free. The competitive landscape will change and most mobile carriers need to alter thei...

According to ABI Research, mobile location-based social networking is expected to become a driver for the adoption of location-based services -- as it provides a unifying framework for a large set of applications such as friend finders, local search and geo-tagging. While many LBS applications will include features allowing the sharing of real-time experiences via fixed social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace, fully-fledged mobile location-based social networking sites will also gain momentum with more than 82 million subscriptions expected by 2013. "While growth will be mainly driven by the availability of multimedia-centric GPS handsets, other mobile form factors will also become important," says ABI Research director Dominique Bonte. Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) with built-in GPS receivers have been announced, with location-based social networking site GyPSii supporting Moblin-based Intel Atom processor-powered MIDs. Connected PNDs and outdoor GPS solutions ...

The recent emergence of location-based mobile social networking services is revolutionizing social net practices by allowing users to share real-life experiences via geo-tagged multimedia content, exchange recommendations about places, identify nearby friends and set up ad-hoc face to face meetings. "Location-based mobile social networking revenues will reach $3.3 billion by 2013, but successful business models may differ from what many observers expect," says ABI Research principal analyst Dominique Bonte. "While location-based advertising integrated with sophisticated algorithms holds a lot of promise, the current reality rather points to licensing and revenue-sharing models as the way forward for social networking start-ups to grow their customer base and reach profitability." Recent evidence includes the agreements between GyPSii and both Garmin and Samsung. Similarly, Loopt has established partnerships with all major U.S. cellular carriers. New positioning tech...

In 2007, North America generated 81 percent of the world's Location Based Services (LBS) revenue. In 2013, that percentage will be just 32 percent. In the same period, Western and Eastern Europe's combined LBS revenues will jump from just 5 percent to 31 percent. The Asia-Pacific region, meanwhile, will see a rise from a 2007 share of 11 percent, to 27 percent. "Location based services are not a zero-sum game," says ABI Research principal analyst Dominique Bonte. "It's not that Americans will lose enthusiasm for LBS. These changing shares of global LBS revenue just reflect the fact that a market which for technical reasons has been largely restricted to North America, will finally grow strongly in other world regions." LBS's slow uptake outside North America has had everything to do with the fact that unlike the CDMA phones so prevalent there, which have utilized GPS to comply with the United States E911 regulatory mandate, the GSM handsets owned by ...

Shipments of GPS-enabled mobile phones will generate over $50 billion in revenues in 2008, rising to $100 billion in 2012. The market for these handsets is expected to grow from around 240 million units in 2008 to over 550 million handset shipments in 2012. At present, most current GPS-enabled handsets are CDMA devices, but increasing numbers of GPS-enabled handsets for 3G/WCDMA networks will start to appear in the market from 2008 onwards. According to ABI Research industry analyst Shailendra Pandey, "The ongoing consolidation in the mobile industry -- including Nokia's acquisition of NAVTEQ, Broadcom's acquisition of Global Locate, CSR's acquisition of NordNav Technologies and Cambridge Positioning Systems, and the tussle between TomTom and Garmin to acquire Tele Atlas -- gives a clear indication of the plans and commitment of industry players to address the GPS-enabled handset market." ABI Research believes that the mobile industry has reached the stage where w...

Global telecommunications industry services revenue will reach $1.7 trillion by the close of 2008, with continued strong growth in wireless leading the way, according to a market analysis report from Insight Research Corporation. According to the new industry market study, overall telecommunications services revenues are expected to grow at a compounded rate of nearly 10.3 percent over the next few years, reaching $2.7 trillion by 2013. Wireless makes the strongest showing across all sectors while wireline follows a distant second. Nearly all of the growth in both sectors is expected to occur in broadband services, with wireless broadband service revenues expected to grow at a compounded rate of more than 70 percent over the forecast period, while wireline broadband services grow at under 10 percent over the same forecast horizon. The "2008 Industry Review, an Anthology of Market Facts and Forecasts" states that in the growth environment set off by the rush to meet subscriber...

While next-generation networks (NGNs) promise rich applications that will eventually offset the decline in voice revenue, most carriers must support IP as well as their legacy networking technologies. Among service providers, business success is often tied to how fast market strategies can be changed to meet competitive pressures and take advantage of new opportunities, according to a new market study by Insight Research. To capture markets and create critical mass, rapid creation and execution of new services has become a necessity. Given the way applications are currently deployed and the complexity of their interaction in continuously evolving networks, new services deployments are difficult, costly, and limit the service provider's ability to drive ARPU and reduce churn. Service providers continue to look for new cost effective means for efficient and effective application-to-network connectivity. As a result, hundreds of millions of dollars will be spent by service provid...

The worldwide market for presence-based telecom services, including Instant Messaging (IM) and Push-to-Talk (PTT), is expected to reach nearly $23 billion in 2007 as an ever increasing number of mobile and wireline carriers provide customized services predicated upon the availability of their customers. According to a new market research study from The Insight Research Corporation, presence-based telecommunication services such as IM and PTT are wildly popular in Asian countries. Carrier revenue from usage of presence-based services in Asia-Pacific markets is nearly double North American revenue. Insight Research's market analysis study, entitled "Presence Based Services Market 2007-2011," notes that presence-based services are part of a worldwide push by carriers to create new IP-enabled services for consumers and business subscribers. The study notes that consumers of mobile and fixed line telecommunications services are adopting presence based services along with othe...

The worldwide market for Location-Based Services (LBS) is expected to reach nearly $1.5 billion in 2007 as an ever increasing number of cellular and other wireless carriers provide customized mobile services based upon a location-awareness of their subscribers. According to a new market research study from The Insight Research Corporation, location-based telecommunication services are most popular in Asia-Pacific countries, where they provide wireless subscribers with tailored information based upon their current physical location. The Insight Research report entitled "Location Based Services Market 2007-2011," notes that location-based services are part of a worldwide push by mobile phone carriers to create new IP-enabled services for consumers and business users. The study notes that consumers of mobile telecommunications services in leading markets are adopting location based services along with other IP-enabled services such as video telephony, fixed-mobile convergence, f...