Posts Tagged ‘Dan Shey’

According to a new forecast issued by market analysis firm ABI Research, worldwide mobile messaging services revenues will increase from $151 billion in 2008 to more than $212 billion by 2013, FierceMobileContent reports.

“Mobile messaging ARPUs are 85 percent-plus of all handset data services revenues regardless of region and will remain so for many years,” said ABI Research principal analyst Dan Shey in the article. “As messaging involves all the biggest players in the mobile industry there will be incentives for all mobile messaging suppliers to work cooperatively to serve customers well and propel all parties through these rough economic waters.”

The report said that a growing number of customers view mobile messaging as a more efficient means of communication than voice services, so mobile services will remain important even during the economic crisis as folks stay mobile while seeking out work.

This builds on last week’s report about how GPS-enabled, location-based social networking will skyrocket in the coming months and years.

A new report from ABI Research forecasts that SMS will remain the top revenue-generating mobile messaging service through 2013, when it will rake in $177 billion. How it gets there will differ from region to region, depending on how successfully it expands into the Web, advertising and social networks in various parts of the world, ABI says.

Currently, developed regions of North America and Europe have the highest messaging ARPUs, and send the most messages from the computer to the mobile device using IM. Mobile users in Asia-Pacific sign up for the most SMS alert services, and Latin Americans are heavy SMS users, but prefer pay-as-you-go for all messaging services.

According to ABI senior analyst Dan Shey, device and messaging platform suppliers will need to pay attention to regional differences in customer type, payment preferences and usage as well as “manage across markets where growth is king – and other markets where product differentiation is king.”

Because of these differences, Shey sees a ripe market for smaller players to break into, either alone or in partnership with a larger company, with new products and services designed to “serve the niche needs of a region or country.”

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