Telecommunications Operators Turn to Mobile Internet

The smartphone market is expected to experience significant growth this year, with over 400 million such phones projected to be sold globally, according to Deloitte’s ninth research in the telecommunications sector.

This year, further penetration of fixed broadband internet networks, IPTV, and competition among mobile operators in the area of mobile broadband internet will continue in Croatia and the region. The research was conducted based on information obtained from conversations with clients, analysts, and Deloitte’s telecommunications, media, and technology experts. More than seven thousand experts from around the world involved in the research believe that the number of smartphones sold will surpass the sales of laptops. Senior Deloitte manager Dejan Ljuština, who presented the research today, believes that globally, the figure of 600 million smartphones that will be used daily this year will cause a ‘traffic jam’ among mobile operators. – There will be a sort of network congestion because users will utilize data services much more, that is, mobile access to broadband internet.

Telecommunications companies will therefore be forced to optimize the current 3G network by imposing traffic limits, or, as is currently the trend in North America, deny users unlimited traffic known as ‘flat-rate’ – said Dejan Ljuština, adding that the largest global mobile companies will only start building 4G networks in 2013, provided that the financial sector financing this transition to modern technology remains stable. In addition to this year being marked by a significant increase in smartphone sales, broadband internet users will switch to mobile phones.

For example, in the past year, the mobile broadband internet market was valued at between one and two billion US dollars; companies that will enable better functioning of mobile broadband internet, those that will not experience ‘traffic jams’, will see traffic grow by almost 100 percent. In our region, says Ljuština, the telecommunications sector has recorded significant and steady growth over the past ten years, especially in the mobile telephony and fixed broadband network segments, but in recent years, the mobile communications market has not grown, and a decline has been recorded in the fixed telephony market.  (Siniša Maksimović)