Already today Canada’s wireless carriers offer coverage to more than 99 per cent of Canadians. 75% of all phone connections in Canada have access to a mobile phone. But it is also expensive for the carriers as they’ve invested more than $1 billion in their infrastructure.
Total revenues in the wireless market for 2009 totaled $16.9 billion.
As market growth figures begin to level off in the U.S., marketers will begin to address other countries that are still seeing new growth, including Canada. By 2014, however, it is expected that Canada will also begin to see growth level off, as it reaches an 85% overall penetration. The United States is expected to hit an 80% market penetration as early as 2013 or sooner, with this figure including both pre-paid and post-paid account types.
Industry insiders expect that mobile growth within Canada will also work in tandem with the growth of smartphone usage as well. A study conducted by Cisco Systems has predicted that smartphone usage will reach a 50% penetration by 2014, up from the current 31% today. It is expected that U.S. figures will remain slightly higher than those seen in Canada.
According to UK based company Icrossing, in February 2010 the mobile browser market share in Canada was dominated by iPhone/iTouch with 86. An interesting observation is that Sony PSP accounts for 3% of the browser market share.
Mobile marketers are anticipating this growth in usage, with approximately 50% of users surveyed stating that they expected to increase their overall mobile spending in 2010, and the other half stating that they expected to spend the same as they did in 2009. Mobile advertising is expected to grow as well, with more than 554 million ads currently being served on Canada’s AdMob network in March 2010, up from just 332.5 million ads in December 2009.
Stay tuned for more global mobile updates, and please contact me for information on expanding your mobile revenue. Whether you are considering a total mobile business plan, just seeking to wring more revenue out of your mobile traffic; studios, paysite programs, solo sites – shoot me a mail and we’ll get you right on the road to more revenue. You’ve done all the work – let’s maximize it for you.
