Half of the world’s population – four billion people – will have mobile technology by 2015, and mobile data services will make up an increasingly large share of the mobile market, the industry’s leading player has predicted.
Jorma Ollila, chairman and chief executive of Nokia, told the 3GSM World Congress last week that he expects its current subscriber base of 1.3 billion to nearly double over the next few years. He predicts that by 2008 there will be around two billion users, which could rise to four billion by 2015.
2004 will see a huge push in 3G services, with both Nokia and Vodafone confident that 3G will become a mass-market proposition this year, and Ollila says that the mobile market will begin to see mobile data services making up a larger share of their businesses.
“Mobile data services will make up an increasingly large share of the mobile market,” he told the Nokia 3GSM press conference. “Accordingly, data is expected to account for close to 30% of the mobile services market in 2007, compared with just over 10% in 2003, clearly showing the trend of mobility being integrated to all aspects of everyday life.”
A recent report by The Yankee Group estimated that half of the European region’s mobile users would be regularly using data content services by 2007 (see Data Services To Boost Mobile Market).
