Aussie telcos to rely on music and video/TV for mobile revenue growth
Aussie telcos to rely on music and video/TV for mobile revenue growth
Aug 8, 2005: With declining voice prices and shrinking profit margin, Australia's mobile carriers are pressed to grow non-voice revenue through higher-value content services. The planned 3G rollouts in the second half of this year by the nation's leading mobile operators will help facilitate this push as it is expected to deliver a wealth of multimedia rich and highly consumable contents to the mobile handset.
That is according to IDC's latest research into the local mobile content market, which estimates that spending on non-voice services this year will total $1.53 billion and will grow ten times the rate of the voice market over the next five years. That study, titled "A Little Less Conversation: Australian Cellular Non-voice 2005-2009 Forecast and Analysis" (ed's note – Elvis' lawyers will be in touch), also finds that the two fastest-growing content categories are mobile music and video/TV services. Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS) (including peer-to-peer, premium, and subscription services) rounds out the top three growth drivers of the Australian mobile content market.
"With the cellular market now exceeding natural saturation, Australian carriers must become innovative and competitive beyond messaging," noted Warren Chaisatien, Mobile and Wireless research manager for IDC Australia. He added the upcoming 3G services expected to hit Australia before the holiday season will promote a dramatic change in consumer mobile usage behaviour.
The study found that of the 17.87 million mobile phone users at the end of 2004, 60 percent used SMS services, 9 percent used MMS services, 10 percent downloaded ring tones or graphics, and 3 percent were mobile data users.
It also predicts that with 3G networks enabling the delivery of multimedia-rich mobile content, 3G content revenue will double every year between 2005 and 2009, while content revenue from 2.5G networks will gradually decline.
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