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Latin America and Asia-Pacific are expected to boast the highest growth, while EMEA is projected a slight decline due to competition and economic turmoil.
Globally, Infonetics expects the mobile service market to grow to $976 billion by 2016, the bulk of which will come from mobile broadband.
Mobile data service revenue rose in every region in 2011, driven by an increase in smartphone usage. Asia-Pacific generated the largest mobile service revenue in 2011, at more than a quarter trillion dollars. Mobile broadband subscribers are expected to account for nearly 40% of all mobile subscribers between 2011 and 2016, up 15%.
“The prophecies of doom for mobile operators’ SMS/MMS cash cow are being overplayed. Despite the popularity of OTT messaging applications, our data shows SMS growing every year from 2012 to 2016, delivering a cumulative $1 trillion in operator revenue during those five years,” said Stéphane Teral principal analyst for mobile infrastructure and carrier economics.
