Mobile broadband market speeding ahead

Gordon Peters
Wednesday, 16 June 2010 01:22

IT Industry - Market

There’s been broader adoption of mobile broadband connectivity for portable computers in the US market beyond the traditional mobile worker over the past 18 months, with IDC now predicting that market to continue to grow significantly through to 2014.

According to IDC, while the US market for mobile broadband connectivity for portable computers has been slow to gain momentum over the past several years, in the past 18 months the market has taken “significant steps” toward broader adoption beyond the traditional mobile worker, with the research firm forecasting the market will grow from 6.5 million subscribers in 2009 to 30.2 million in 2014, which it says accounts for a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 36.1% over the forecast period.

Carrie MacGillivray, program manager, mobility services at IDC, said the introduction of subsidized netbooks and tablets, changes to pricing structures, and the early availability of 4G with WiMAX (and upcoming LTE deployments) have begun to “spur interest among the consumer segment about the power of mobile broadband as a secondary access method beyond wired broadband,” and she says the possibility of mobile broadband becoming a primary access technology remains a “figment of our imagination,” but it is not “beyond the realm of possibility in for the longer term.”

"Mobile broadband is growing in importance for both consumers adopting the service and the operators offering connectivity," says MacGillivray, adding that "diversity in pricing plans, new computing devices capable of mobile broadband connections, and the promise of a 4G world with faster speeds are a tempting proposition for customers looking to be ubiquitously connected regardless of location, anytime."

According to MacGillivray, the evolving landscape of wirelessly connected devices such as Apple’s iPad will also have a positive impact on this market. “As devices such as tablets — which are rich in digital media experiences — become more broadly available and consumed, the appetite for instantaneous connectivity will drive growth around mobile broadband.”

IDC says it is an exciting time for mobile broadband, and that 2010 will see growing interest and adoption of services, but being at the threshold of what it calls a "world with 4G" — both WiMAX and LTE fully deployed — will play a positive role in spurring growth within the consumer and the business segment.