Johannesburg, 18 Oct 2011
Internet traffic generated by mobile devices continues to grow, doubling between the second quarter of 2010 and the second quarter of 2011, and users with modern, capable devices without spending limitations are increasingly using their smartphones to access the Internet.
This emerged last week at a workshop hosted by Ericsson on the socio-economic impacts of improving broadband speeds.
Speaking at the event, Aingharan Kanagaratnam, head of practice: mobile broadband for Ericsson sub-Saharan Africa, said there are about 5.7 billion global mobile subscribers today.
“There are also 785 000 applications in app stores; 15 billion downloaded apps; while 200 billion smartphones were shipped in 2010.”
He believes that by 2020, there will be 50 billion connected devices, as the global middle-class consumer base continues to grow.
Kanagaratnam also noted that, according to findings of a new measurement from Ericsson, to be released as part of Akamai's “State of the Internet” report, the first quarter of 2011 displayed 8% growth in mobile data traffic.
In more detail, he added, the mobile data growth patterns reveal that the quality of a smartphone affects which applications people use, and the amount of time they surf the mobile Internet.
“All these developments hint that we are on the brink of a networked society. The strength of the mobile network is that it is the most ubiquitous communications network we have,” he said.
Ericsson notes that an active smartphone user generates more than 1MB of traffic per day. Factors including screen size, age and price of the smartphone have a stronger correlation with median traffic than the operating system, it adds.
It is notable that in North America, high-end smartphones generate twice the traffic than comparable smartphones at the operators analysed in Asia and Europe.
Johan Wibergh, head of Ericsson's Business Unit Networks, comments: “Our market research confirms that high-end smartphone users are increasingly accessing the Internet on their phones. This underscores the importance of having networks that are smart, scaleable and provide superior performance to deliver on expected user experience.”
Additionally, Ericsson found that among heavy users, the cumulative data generated by video is significantly higher than for other activities. The top 5% to 10% of smartphone users are willing to spend up to 40 minutes a day watching online videos. However, the average user spends about 30 seconds a day watching online videos.
The implication is that high-end users are driving traffic and demand for prioritised services. Wibergh adds: “That is why we believe tiered pricing models in combination with traffic management are key for operators as well as consumers.”
According to a Cisco white paper, global mobile data traffic will increase 26-fold between 2010 and 2015. Mobile data traffic will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 92% from 2010 to 2015, reaching 6.3 exabytes per month by 2015, says the networking giant.
It adds that smartphones represent only 13% of total global handsets in use today, but they account for over 78% of total global handset traffic.
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