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China Ripe for Mobile Data Explosion - Research
China is gearing up for a shindig that will rock the wireless data services sector. At least, that's what Boston, Massachusetts-based Yankee Group believes.
In a report the research firm released on Thursday, analysts estimated the wireless data services market in China will swell to US$5.68 billion by the end of 2005 from the US$2.72 million it totaled in 1999.
The report, entitled "Mobile Data Services in China: The Party Has Yet to Start," also estimated that the number of wireless data users in the nation will reach 112.5 million by 2005 -- which will be 40 percent of the nation's mobile subscribers and 8 percent of the total population.
WAP takes a nap "WAP (wireless application protocol) is clumsy on top of 2G (second generation) networks and existing handsets; but with GPRS (general packet radio service), mobile Internet is a different story," Yankee analyst Larry Wan said. "As massive GPRS networks are deployed in China within the next three years, mobile Internet services will soon be taking off, accounting for about 40 percent of total data revenue by 2005."
For the interim period, Yankee expects SMS (short message service) will take a strong hold in the Chinese wireless market. The company predicted that SMS will account for 60 percent of total data revenue for operators over the next five years.
Yankee charted its map for mobile data growth in China by first examining the development and growth of SMS, WAP, GPRS and 3G (third generation) services in the country. Then it examined what the top mobile vendors and operators were doing to meet consumer and business demand.
Asia has company China is not the only place where analysts have bullish outlooks for mobile data services.
In June, the Gartner research outfit predicted that mobility-focused applications and data services will grow the North American wireless market to 137.5 million subscribers in 2005 from 7.3 million in 2000.
Specifically, Gartner pegged this growth to the rollout of packet data networks -- such as GPRS -- as well as to increased overall use of wireless services, such as SMS, to receive messages and e-mail.
Gartner also said it believes that less expensive handsets and enterprise-specific applications will help drive data growth in North America.
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