Cisco White Paper c11-520862
Cisco White Paper c11-520862
Cisco Visual Networking Index: Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast Update, 20102015
February 1, 2011 The Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI) Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast Update is part of the comprehensive Cisco VNI Forecast, an ongoing initiative to track and forecast the impact of visual networking applications on global networks. This paper presents some of Ciscos major global mobile data traffic projections and growth trends. Executive Summary
The Mobile Network in 2010 and 2011 Global mobile data traffic grew 2.6-fold in 2010, nearly tripling for the third year in a row. The 2010 mobile data traffic growth rate was higher than anticipated. Last years forecast projected that the growth rate would be 149 percent. This years estimate is that global mobile data traffic grew 159 percent in 2010. Last years mobile data traffic was three times the size of the entire global Internet in 2000. Global mobile data traffic in 2010 (237 petabytes per month) was over three times greater than the total global Internet traffic in 2000 (75 petabytes per month). Mobile video traffic will exceed 50 percent for the first time in 2011. Mobile video traffic was 49.8 percent of total mobile data traffic at the end of 2010, and will account for 52.8 percent of traffic by the end of 2011. Mobile network connection speeds doubled in 2010. Globally, the average mobile network downstream speed in 2010 was 215 kilobits per second (kbps), up from 101 kbps in 2009. The average mobile network connection speed for smartphones in 2010 was 1040 kbps, up from 625 kbps in 2009. The top 1 percent of mobile data subscribers generate over 20 percent of mobile data traffic, down from 30 percent 1 year ago. According to a mobile data usage study conducted by Cisco, mobile data traffic has evened out over the last year and now matches the 1:20 ratio that has been true of fixed networks for several years. Similarly, the top 10 percent of mobile data subscribers now generate approximately 60 percent of mobile data traffic, down from 70 percent at the beginning of the year.
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Average smartphone usage doubled in 2010. The average amount of traffic per smartphone in 2010 was 79 MB per month, up from 35 MB per month in 2009. Smartphones represent only 13 percent of total global handsets in use today, but they represent over 78 percent of total global handset traffic. In 2010, the typical smartphone generated 24 times more mobile data traffic (79 MB per month) than the typical basic-feature cell phone (which generated only 3.3 MB per month of mobile data traffic). Globally, 31 percent of smartphone traffic was offloaded onto the fixed network through dual-mode or femtocell in 2010. Last year, 14.3 petabytes of smartphone and tablet traffic were offloaded onto the fixed network each month. Without offload, traffic originating from smartphones and tablets would have been 51 petabytes per month rather than 37 petabytes per month in 2010. Android approaches iPhone levels of data use. At the beginning of the year, iPhone consumption was at least 4 times higher than that of any other smartphone platform. Toward the end of the year, iPhone consumption was only 1.75 times higher than that of the second-highest platform, Android. In 2010, 3 million tablets were connected to the mobile network, and each tablet generated 5 times more traffic than the average smartphone. In 2010, mobile data traffic per tablet was 405 MB per month, compared to 79 MB per month per smartphone. There were 94 million laptops on the mobile network in 2010, and each laptop generated 22 times more traffic than the average smartphone. Mobile data traffic per laptop was 1.7 GB per month, up 49 percent from 1.1 GB per month in 2009. Nonsmartphone usage increased 2.2-fold to 3.3 MB per month in 2010, compared to 1.5 MB per month in 2009. Basic handsets still make up the vast majority of devices on the network (87 percent). There are 48 million people in the world who have mobile phones, even though they do not have electricity at home. The mobile network has extended beyond the boundaries of the power grid. The Mobile Network in 2015 Global mobile data traffic will increase 26-fold between 2010 and 2015. Mobile data traffic will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 92 percent from 2010 to 2015, reaching 6.3 exabytes per month by 2015. There will be nearly one mobile device per capita by 2015. There will be over 7.1 billion mobile-connected devices, including machine-to-machine (M2M) modules, in 2015approximately equal to the worlds population in 2015 (7.2 billion). Mobile network connection speeds will increase 10-fold by 2015. The average mobile network connection speed (215 kbps in 2010) will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 60 percent, and will exceed 2.2 megabits per second (Mbps) in 2015. Two-thirds of the worlds mobile data traffic will be video by 2015. Mobile video will more than double every year between 2010 and 2015. Mobile video has the highest growth rate of any application category measured within the Cisco VNI forecast at this time. Mobile-connected tablets will generate as much traffic in 2015 as the entire global mobile network in 2010. The amount of mobile data traffic generated by tablets in 2015 (248 petabytes per month) will be approximately equal to the total amount of global mobile data traffic in 2010 (242 petabytes per month). The same will be true of M2M traffic, which will reach 295 petabytes per month in 2015.
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The average smartphone will generate 1.3 GB of traffic per month in 2015, a 16-fold increase over the 2010 average of 79 MB per month. Aggregate smartphone traffic in 2015 will be 47 times greater than it is today, with a CAGR of 116 percent. By 2015, over 800 million terabytes of mobile data traffic will be offloaded to the fixed network by means of dual-mode devices and femtocells. Without dual-mode and femtocell offload of smartphone and tablet traffic, total mobile data traffic would reach 7.1 exabytes per month in 2015, growing at a CAGR of 95 percent. The Middle East and Africa will have the strongest mobile data traffic growth of any region at 129 percent CAGR, followed by Latin America at 111 percent and Central and Eastern Europe at 102 percent. There will be 788 million mobile-only Internet users by 2015. The mobile-only Internet population will grow 56fold from 14 million at the end of 2010 to 788 million by the end of 2015. The mobile network will break the electricity barrier in more than 4 major regions by 2015. By 2015, 4 major regions (Sub-Saharan Africa, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and the Middle East) and 40 countries (including India, Indonesia, and Nigeria) will have more people with mobile network access than with access to electricity at home. The off-grid, on-net population will reach 138 million by 2015. Appendix A summarizes the details and methodology of the VNI forecast.
Japan
China Unicoms 3G traffic increased 62% in a single quarter from Q1 to Q2 of 2010. SFRs mobile data traffic has tripled each year since 2008. Telecom Italia delivered 15 times more mobile data traffic in 2010 than in 2007. Vodafones European mobile data traffic increased 115% from 1Q 2009 to 2Q 2009, and 88% from 2Q 2009 to 2Q 2010. TeliaSonera expects mobile data traffic to double each year for the next 5 years. AT&T reports that traffic grew 30-fold from 3Q 2009 to 3Q 2010. Google reports that the number of YouTube videos delivered to mobile devices tripled in 2010, reaching 200 million video views per day.
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Why Was Growth Higher than Expected in 2010? One reason for the unexpectedly strong growth in 2010 was the accelerated adoption of smartphones by mobile phone subscribers, in combination with the much higher usage profile of smartphones relative to basic handsets. Last year we expected that the smartphone installed base would increase 22 percent in 2010, but Informa Telecoms and Media data indicates that the number of smartphones in use grew by 32 percent during the year. In addition to the increase in smartphone adoption, there was a sharp increase in those smartphones that have the highest usage profile: iPhones and Android phones. The number of iPhones and Android devices in use grew 72 percent in 2010, bringing the combined iOS and Android share of smartphones to 23 percent, up from 11 percent in 2009. Operators such as Vodafone have reiterated that smartphone users generate 10 to 20 times the traffic of their nonsmartphone counterparts. Operators have also reported that iPhones generate 5 to 10 times the traffic of the average smartphone, and according to a recent analysis of usage data conducted by Cisco, Android phones are catching up to iPhones in usage volume. In addition to the evolving handset mix, other high-usage devices increased their presence on the mobile network. The number of mobile-connected laptops grew by 63 percent in 2010. A large percentage of mobile-connected laptop users consider mobile broadband their primary means of accessing the Internet, and in many regions there is a pronounced mobile broadband substitution effect. A recent survey by Ofcom indicates that the percentage of Internet users who have substituted mobile broadband for fixed broadband is 6 percent in the United Kingdom, 11 percent in Germany, and 13 percent in Italy. As expected, substitution users generate much more traffic than users who use mobile broadband as a complement to fixed networking. Tablets also made their first appearance on the mobile network in 2010, bringing a data usage profile that is 5 times higher than that of a smartphone. Table 2 summarizes the number of each type of device and the traffic multipliers associated with them.
Table 2.
Device Smartphones iOS and Android phones Mobile-connected tablets Mobile-connected laptops
Devices with High Usage Profiles Are Growing in Number on the Mobile Network
Millions in Use 2009 399 45 0.3 58 Millions in Use 2010 526 121 3.0 94 Usage Multiplier Relative to Nonsmartphone 24 Nonsmartphones 96 Nonsmartphones 122 Nonsmartphones 515 Nonsmartphones Usage Multiplier Relative to Smartphone 1 Smartphone 4 Smartphones 5 Smartphones 22 Smartphones
Source: Informa Telecoms and Media, Strategy Analytics, Cisco VNI Mobile, 2011
What is the Outlook for 2011? Cisco estimates that traffic in 2011 will grow 131 percent, reflecting a slight tapering in growth rates. The evolving device mix and the migration of traffic from the fixed network to the mobile network have the potential to bring the growth rate higher, while tiered pricing and traffic offload may reduce this effect. The current growth rates of mobile data traffic resemble those of the fixed network from 1997 through 2001, when the average yearly growth was 150 percent. In the case of the fixed network, the growth rate remained in the range of 150 percent for 5 years.
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Table 3.
Global Mobile Data Growth Today is Similar to Global Internet Growth (Fixed) in the Late 1990s
Global Mobile Data Traffic Growth 2008 2009 2010 2011 (estimate) 2012 (estimate) 156% 140% 159% 131% 113%
Global Internet Traffic Growth 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 178% 124% 128% 195% 133%
In the long term, mobile data and fixed traffic should settle into the same growth rate, although the mobile data growth rate is likely to remain higher than the fixed growth rate for the next 7 to 10 years.
Western Europe and Asia Pacific will account for over half of global mobile traffic by 2015, as shown in Figure 2. Middle East and Africa will experience the highest CAGR of 129 percent, increasing 63-fold over the forecast period. The emerging market regions (Central and Eastern Europe, Latin America, and Middle East and Africa) will have the highest growth and will represent an increasing share of total mobile data traffic, from 12 percent at the end of 2010 to 20 percent by 2015.
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Figure 2.
In the sections that follow, we identify nine major trends behind the growth of mobile data traffic.
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The introduction of laptops, tablets, and high-end handsets onto mobile networks is a major generator of traffic, because these devices offer the consumer content and applications not supported by the previous generation of mobile devices. As shown in Figure 4, a single laptop can generate as much traffic as 515 basic-feature phones, and a smartphone creates as much traffic as 24 basic-feature phones.
Figure 4. High-End Devices Can Multiply Traffic
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The growth in usage per device outpaces the growth in the number of devices. As shown in Table 5, the growth rate of new-device mobile data traffic is 2 to 5 times greater than the growth rate of users.
Table 5.
Device Type Smartphone Portable gaming console Tablet Laptop and netbook M2M module Source: Cisco VNI Mobile, 2011
Comparison of Global Device Unit Growth and Global Mobile Data Traffic Growth
Growth in Users, 2010-2015 CAGR 24% 79% 105% 42% 53% Growth in Mobile Data Traffic, 2010-2015 CAGR 116% 130% 190% 85% 109%
The following are a few of the main promoters of growth in average usage:
As mobile network connection speeds increase, the average bit rate of content accessed through the mobile network will increase. High-definition video will be more prevalent, and the proportion of streamed content as compared to side-loaded content is also expected to increase with average mobile network connection speed.
As the battery life of mobile devices improves, mobile minutes of use will increase. The amount of long-form video viewed on mobile devices will grow as battery life and processing power advances.
As mobile network capacity improves, operators are more likely to offer mobile broadband packages comparable in price and speed to those of fixed broadband, thereby encouraging mobile broadband substitution. The usage profile of substitution users is substantially higher than average.
The shift towards unicast from broadcast video will affect mobile networks as much as it will affect fixed networks. Internet radio and Internet video are unicast, meaning that there is one data stream per user, unlike broadcast, where one stream serves many users. The shift from broadcast to unicast means that traffic can increase dramatically even while the total amount of time spent watching video remains relatively constant.
Mobile devices increase an individuals contact time with the network, and it is likely that in the early stages of mobile Internet use, this increased contact time will lead to an increase in overall minutes of use per user. However, not all of the increase in mobile data traffic can be attributed to traffic migration to the mobile network from the fixed network. Many uniquely mobile applications have already emerged, such as location-based applications and services.
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Figure 5.
Note that last years forecast estimated that 66 percent of mobile network traffic would be video traffic by 2014. The mobile video percentage estimated for 2015 is not higher than 66 percent because of the inclusion of M2M traffic in this years forecast.
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Table 6.
Global Asia Pacific Latin America North America Western Europe Japan Central and Eastern Europe Middle East and Africa Source: Cisco VNI Mobile, 2011
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Table 7.
Projected Dual-Mode and Femtocell Traffic Offload as a Percentage of Smartphone and Tablet Traffic
2010 2011 21% 24% 28% 31% 32% 36% 31% 24% 14% 20% 24% 27% 23% 23% 32% 40% 28% 37% 41% 2012 21% 19% 30% 33% 33% 37% 31% 24% 13% 19% 24% 27% 26% 26% 33% 41% 27% 37% 43% 2013 22% 15% 31% 35% 33% 39% 30% 24% 12% 18% 23% 27% 29% 28% 35% 40% 27% 36% 43% 2014 22% 10% 32% 37% 34% 41% 29% 23% 10% 17% 23% 26% 31% 29% 37% 39% 26% 35% 43% 2015 23% 5% 33% 39% 35% 42% 28% 22% 9% 16% 23% 26% 34% 30% 38% 37% 25% 34% 42%
China India Korea Rest of Asia Pacific Rest of Central and Eastern Europe Russia Japan Brazil Mexico Rest of Latin America Rest of Middle East and Africa South Africa Canada U.S. France Germany Italy Rest of Western Europe U.K. Source: Cisco VNI Mobile, 2011
20% 28% 28% 30% 32% 35% 32% 23% 16% 21% 26% 29% 21% 21% 31% 38% 29% 35% 40%
In many developing countries and regions, the offload percentage declines, while in developed regions, the offload factor steadily rises throughout the forecast period. The declining offload factor in developing markets is due to a decreasing number of mobile data users with Wi-Fi access at home. Without offload, the combined amount of tablet and smartphone traffic would be 2.7 exabytes per month in 2015, up 54-fold from 2010. With offload, smartphone and tablet traffic will amount to 1.9 exabytes per month in 2015, up 52-fold from 2010. Over 800 million terabytes of mobile data traffic will be offloaded in 2015. The total offload for smartphones and tablets will be 39 percent in 2015, up from 31 percent in 2010 (Figure 6).
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Figure 6.
Because dual-mode devices are primarily smartphones and tablets, the overall offload amount in the current year is smaller than that shown above, as nonsmartphones still account for approximately one quarter of handset traffic.
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Table 8.
Projected Average Mobile Network Connection Speeds (in kbps) by Region and Country
2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 CAGR 2010-2015
Global Global speed: All handsets Global speed: Smartphones By Region Asia Pacific Latin America North America Western Europe Japan Central and Eastern Europe Middle East and Africa By Country Australia Brazil Canada China France Germany India Italy Japan Korea Mexico New Zealand Rest of Asia Pacific Rest of Central and Eastern Europe Rest of Latin America Rest of Middle East and Africa Rest of Western Europe Russia South Africa U.K. U.S. Source: Cisco VNI Mobile, 2011 Current and historical speeds are based on data from Ciscos GiST (Global Internet Speed Test) application and Ooklas Speedtest. Forward projections for mobile data speeds are based on third-party forecasts for the relative proportions of 2G, 3G, 3.5G, and 4G among mobile connections through 2015. For more information about Cisco GIST, please visit [Link]. 413 26 216 13 111 61 1 158 769 868 6 352 24 56 6 10 153 20 51 306 389 953 74 683 50 530 306 19 465 1,394 1,447 36 715 85 140 38 43 353 75 268 820 709 1,397 145 1,217 99 1,307 730 61 1,073 2,009 1,950 80 1,355 168 292 79 105 701 163 655 1,466 1,059 1,967 275 1,931 208 2,516 1,462 125 2,092 2,631 2,521 175 2,048 321 577 165 238 1,245 356 1,386 2,338 1,526 2,674 508 2,860 428 3,992 2,486 262 3,475 3,353 3,193 384 2,986 608 1,070 326 503 2,001 741 2,474 3,398 2,143 3,556 895 4,109 816 5,662 3,668 546 5,142 4,282 3,981 822 4,213 1,103 1,854 598 977 2,950 1,422 3,842 4,668 2,902 4,649 1,458 5,680 1,384 7,510 4,929 1,037 7,037 5,509 4,984 1,557 5,738 1,860 2,966 997 1,738 4,077 2,448 5,454 6,155 3,848 37% 82% 53% 94% 70% 74% 124% 72% 32% 28% 112% 52% 85% 84% 93% 110% 63% 101% 83% 50% 40% 37 13 376 151 769 43 13 74 50 707 444 1,394 117 59 115 103 1,071 932 2,009 246 141 188 206 1,556 1,696 2,631 499 309 328 402 2,198 2,708 3,353 955 620 584 744 2,996 3,919 4,282 1,704 1,142 984 1,260 3,994 5,336 5,509 2,786 1,948 68% 91% 41% 64% 32% 89% 101% 101 614 215 1,038 359 1,443 584 1,953 934 2,608 1,465 3,424 2,220 4,404 60% 34%
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The impact of tiered pricing is assumed to be a gradual rather than a sudden phenomenon Mobile broadband substitution is tempered according to common data caps in the country or region. For instance, mobile broadband packages in South Africa are comparatively expensive with relatively low data caps, so mobile broadband substitution usage is tempered by nearly 30 percent. A mobile broadband user who might otherwise generate 1.2 GB of traffic per month instead uses 0.9 GB per month.
Growth rates per user slowed through 2012. After 2012 it is assumed that capacity upgrades will allow service providers to raise data caps.
Business and consumer security and surveillance: Video streams such as commercial security cameras, nannycams, petcams, etc. through mobile enabled residential or commercial gateways fall into this category. During the Shanghai World Expo 2010, 10,000 security cameras were installed on buses, trucks, and emergency vehicles. In normal circumstances, video is captured and uploaded when a Wi-Fi connection is available. When live monitoring is needed, video is transmitted over the mobile network at 2 frames per second. If each frame is 0.5 MB, then an hour of this video generates 3.6 GB. If half of these vehicles transmitted 1 hour of video over the course of a month, this would generate 18 petabytes of mobile data traffic, more that total global mobile data traffic in 2007.
Health care: In the medical, well-being, and sports and fitness industries, devices and services used by medical personnel are being connected to reduce errors.
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Inventory and fleet management: Wi-Fi is being considered as an adjunct to cellular-based fleet management connectivity, to allow a vehicle to use cellular technology in the field, and support lower-cost, higher-speed Wi-Fi to download and upload data while in fleet headquarters and loading areas.
Telematics: Trip assistance, navigation, and vehicle management are gaining greater consumer adoption, along with broadband-to-the-car offerings that use a cellular connection to the vehicle and then distribute the connection to notebook PCs and other devices within the vehicle through Wi-Fi.
Figure 7.
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Figure 8.
Mobile Access in 4 Major Regions Will Break the Electricity Barrier by 2015
Selling a charge for a mobile phonefrom a bank of wired outlets or even an adapted car batteryhas become a cottage industry in many developing countries. Individuals, even those below the poverty line, are finding that mobile access increases their financial prospects, and are willing to go to great lengths to maintain access. Operators and governments also have incentives to encourage off-grid access to mobile services. Operators are developing new, highly profitable business models that are attractive and affordable to the base of the global economic pyramid. Governments and communities are finding that gross domestic product (GDP) and local economic growth appear to be correlated with mobile growth. The end result is that the off-grid, on-net population will reach 138 million by 2015 (Figure 9). The mobile network will break the electricity barrier in 4 major regions and more than 40 countries (including India, Indonesia, and Nigeria) by 2015. Breaking the electricity barrier may be a short-lived phenomenon, since electricity access is likely to catch up to mobile access in the long term (perhaps even in response to the demand for mobile services), but it is nevertheless a testament to the socio-economic impact of network access that mobile has extended beyond the reach of the power grid.
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Figure 9.
Conclusion
Mobile data is well on its way to become a necessity. Mobile voice service is already considered a necessity by most, and mobile data, video, and TV services are fast becoming an essential part of consumers lives. Used extensively by consumer as well the enterprise segments, and seeing impressive uptakes in both developed and emerging markets, mobility has proven to be transformational. Mobile subscribers are growing rapidly and bandwidth demand due to data and video is increasing. Mobile M2M connections continue to increase. The next 5 years are projected to provide unabated mobile video adoption despite the recessionary trends in macroeconomic conditions. Backhaul capacity must increase so mobile broadband, data access, and video services can effectively support consumer usage trends and keep mobile infrastructure costs in check. Deploying next-generation mobile networks requires greater service portability and interoperability. With the proliferation of mobile and portable devices, there is an imminent need for networks to allow all these devices to be connected transparently, with the network providing high performance computing and delivering enhanced real time video and multimedia. This openness will broaden the range of applications and services that can be shared, creating a highly enhanced mobile broadband experience. The expansion of wireless presence will increase the number of consumers who access and rely on mobile networks, creating a need for greater economies of scale and lower cost per bit.
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As many business models emerge with new forms of advertising, media and content partnerships, mobile services including M2M, live gaming and looking into the future, augmented reality, a mutually beneficial situation needs to be developed for service providers and over-the-top providers. New partnerships, ecosystems, and strategic consolidations are expected as mobile operators, content providers, application developers, and others seek to monetize the video traffic that traverses mobile networks. Operators must solve the challenge of effectively monetizing video traffic while investing and increasing infrastructure capital expenditures. They must become more agile and able to quickly change course and provide innovative services to engage the Web 3.0 consumer. As the net neutrality regulatory process and business models of the operators evolve, there is an unmet demand from consumers for the highest quality and speeds. As wireless technologies aim to provide experiences formerly only available through wired networks, the next few years will be critical for operators and service providers to plan future network deployments that will create a adaptable platform upon which will deploy the multitude of mobile enabled devices and applications of the future.
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The Cisco VNI Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast relies in part upon data published by Informa Telecoms and Media, Strategy Analytics, Infonetics, Datamonitor, Gartner, IDC, DellOro, Synergy, Nielsen, comScore, and the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). The Cisco VNI methodology begins with the number and growth of connections and devices, applies adoption rates for applications, and then multiplies the applications user base by Ciscos estimated minutes of use and KB per minute for that application. The methodology has evolved to link assumptions more closely with fundamental drivers, to use data sources unique to Cisco, and to provide a high degree of application, segment, geographic, and device specificity.
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Inclusion of fundamental drivers. As with the fixed IP traffic forecast, each Cisco VNI Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast update increases the linkages between the main assumptions and fundamental factors such as available connection speed, pricing of connections and devices, computational processing power, screen size and resolution, and even device battery life. This update focuses on the relationship of mobile connection speeds and the KB-per-minute assumptions in the forecast model. Proprietary data from the Cisco Global Internet Speed Test (GIST) application was used as a baseline for current-year smartphone connection speeds for each country.
Device-centric approach. As the number and variety of devices on the mobile network continue to increase, it becomes essential to model traffic at the device level rather than the connection level. This Cisco VNI Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast update details traffic to smartphones; nonsmartphones; laptops, tablets, and netbooks; e-readers; digital still cameras; digital video cameras; digital photo frames; in-car entertainment systems; and handheld gaming consoles.
Estimation of the impact of traffic offload. The Cisco VNI Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast model now quantifies the effect of dual-mode devices and femtocells on handset traffic. Proprietary data from Ciscos IBSG Connected Life Market Watch was used to model offload effects.
Increased application-level specificity. The forecast now offers a deeper and wider range of application specificity.
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Appendix B: A Case Study on the Initial Impact of Tiered Pricing on Mobile Data Usage
An increasing number of service providers worldwide are moving from unlimited data plans to tiered mobile data packages. Cisco is following this trend closely and recently completed a case study to determine the initial impact of tiered pricing on mobile data traffic. The case study is based on the data of a Global Top 50 service provider and spans the months immediately preceding and following the implementation of tiered pricing. Study Findings The impact of tiered pricing on traffic does not appear to be immediate. Three months after the service provider in this case study introduced tiered pricing, 20 percent of smartphone users were on tiered plans, but traffic growth continued at a rate of 5 percent per month. Though there may turn out to be longer-term effects, the revenue measures in the 3 months following the pricing change reflect continued mobile data traffic growth. Traffic volumes did not decrease. Traffic volumes of mobile data users in the 3 months after the pricing change were 15 percent higher than volumes in the 3 months prior to the pricing change, growing from an average of 114 megabytes per month in the 3 months before tiered pricing to 131 megabytes per month in the 3 months after tiered pricing. Average monthly growth for all mobile users in the 9 months covered by the study was 5 percent. Traffic growth has not slowed. There was no statistically significant slowing of monthly growth rates in the 3 months after the pricing change compared to growth rates in the 6 prior months. The percentage of users generating over 200 megabytes per month increased from 20 percent to 30 percent, over the course of 9 months. The increased data usage is a short-term positive result for service providers because it will lead to a greater uptake of higher-tiered packages. Long-term, service providers in competitive markets may need tiers that keep pace with usage increases, or tiers that are defined in terms of services rather than data volumes. The top 1 percent of subscribers generated 21 percent of traffic in the last 3 months of the study, down from 28 percent in the first 3 months. The most pronounced change found in the study was the shift in the amount of traffic from the top 1 percent of subscribers, which declined from 28 percent in the first 3 months to 21 percent in the last 3 months. In contrast, the lowest 80 percent of data users was responsible for 21 percent of the total data traffic in the last 3 months, an increase from 19 percent in the first 3 months. If this trend holds for other service providers, it may be a net positive effect for the industry, because traffic that is more evenly distributed across the subscriber base may increase profitability. Android approaches iPhone-like levels of data use. At the beginning of the study, iPhone consumption was at least 4 times higher than that of any other smartphone platform supported by the service provider. In the final months of the study, iPhone consumption was only 1.75 times higher than that of the second-highest platform, Android. About This Study The findings in this study are based on Ciscos analysis of data provided by a third-party data analysis firm. This firm maintains a panel of volunteer participants who have given the company access to their mobile service bills, including KB of data usage. The data in this study reflects usage associated with over 15,000 devices and spans 9 months. Ciscos analysis of the data consists of categorizing the devices and users, incorporating additional thirdparty information on device characteristics, and performing exploratory and statistical data analysis.
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Tiered Offerings and Mobile Data Traffic Growth For most aggregate measures of data consumption, the effect of tiered pricing has yet to appear. The service provider did not require existing subscribers to immediately convert to the new system, yet almost 20 percent of mobile data subscribers migrated to one of the tiered plans within 3 months. It may take additional time before the full effects of tiered pricing on traffic are visible, but it is clear that the impact will be gradual. Mobile data traffic per user grew 5 percent per month, on average (Table 10).
Table 10. On Average, Mobile Data Traffic per User Grew 5 Percent per Month
MB per User per Month Month 1 All mobile users Mobile data users* 91 175 Month 2 99 191 Month 3 94 185 Month 4 108 206 Month 5 114 216 Month 6 121 229 Month 7 124 233 Month 8 133 244 Month 9 137 251 Average Monthly Growth 5.4% 4.7%
* Mobile Data Users are defined as those who generate at least 10 KB of data traffic per month. Source: Cisco, 2011
Traffic volumes in the final 3 months were significantly higher than the volumes in months 4 through 6 (with significance defined as a difference between measurements that exceeds 1 standard deviation). Although month-tomonth growth rates did appear to be lower in months 7 through 9 compared to the earlier months, this was not a statistically significant decrease. It is possible that this is an early sign of slower growth rates for mobile data, should the growth rates continue to be lower than the growth rates prior to the introduction of tiered pricing at the end of month 6, but the data available at this time indicates no significant change (Table 11).
Table 11. Mobile Users Generated Significantly More Traffic after Pricing Change; Growth Rate Did Not Slow
MB per User per Month in 3 Months Before Pricing Change All mobile users Mobile data users* 114 217 MB per User per Month in 3 Months After Pricing Change 131 243 Statistically Significant Increase in Volume? Yes Yes Month-to-Month Growth in 3 Months After Pricing Change 6.1% 5.6% Month-to-Month Growth in 3 Months After Pricing Change 4.3% 3.1% Statistically Significant Decline in Growth Rate? No No
* Mobile Data Users are defined as those who generate at least 10 KB of data traffic per month. Source: Cisco, 2011
The number of mobile data users generating more than 2 GB per month has more than doubled over the course of the study, and the percentage of users generating over 200 MB per month increased from 20 percent to 30 percent.
Table 12.
Data Usage Month 1 Greater than 5 GB Between 2 GB and 5 GB Between 200 MB and 2 GB Less Than 200 MB Source: Cisco, 2011 0.3% 2.0% 18% 79% Month 2 0.3% 2.5% 19% 78% Month 3 0.2% 2.7% 19% 78%
Five Percent of Mobile Data Users Consume More Than 2 GB per Month
Percent of Data Users Month 4 0.3% 3.3% 22% 74% Month 5 0.2% 3.6% 22% 74% Month 6 0.3% 3.9% 24% 72% Month 7 0.3% 3.9% 25% 71% Month 8 0.3% 4.5% 25% 71% Month 9 0.4% 4.6% 24% 71%
The rapid increase in data usage presents a challenge to service providers who have implemented tiers defined solely in terms of usage limits. Mobile data caps that fall too far behind usage volumes may create opportunities for competitors in the market. For this reason, many service providers are creating more nuanced tiers and data addons, such as a separate charge for tethering and hotspot functionality. Such offerings tend to require less vigilance on the part of subscribers than data caps, yet still monetize scenarios that tend to have high data usage.
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Mobile Data Traffic Volume by Operating System At the beginning of the study, iPhone consumption was at least 4 times higher than any other platform. In the final months of the study, iPhone consumption was only 1.75 times higher than the second-highest platform, Android. Android phones have experienced the highest month-to-month growth rate, 57 percent, roughly doubling every 2 months. Despite this growth, Android was one of the platforms that seemed to be affected the most by the introduction of tiered pricing, with monthly growth flattening in the final 3 months, and with a significant decline in month-to-month growth rates after the first 6 months.
Table 13. iPhones Generate 350 MB per Month; Android Phones in Second Place With 200 MB per Month
Month 1 Month 2 Month 3 Month 4 Month 5 Month 6* Month 7 Month 8 Month 9 Average Monthly Growth 56.7% 5.9% 2.5% 27.8% 5.0% 37.9% 1.0% 5.7%
Operating System
Android Blackberry Apple (iOS) Palm OS Proprietary Symbian OS Windows Mobile 5 and earlier Windows Mobile 6 and later Source: Cisco, 2011
20 68 304 3 9 21 30 72
55 74 334 4 10 27 39 77
50 77 321 3 9 48 30 59
146 86 333 5 11 30 24 61
264 88 350 5 13 31 32 70
331 92 368 6 13 46 30 83
Figure 10.
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The Changing Role of the Top 1 Percent of Mobile Data Subscribers As with fixed broadband, the top 1 percent of mobile data subscribers is responsible for a disproportionate amount of mobile data traffic. However, according to the data from this study, this disproportion is becoming less pronounced with time. The amount of traffic due to the top 1 percent of subscribers declined from 28 percent in the first 3 months to 21 percent in the last 3 months. In contrast, the lowest 80 percent of data users was responsible for 21 percent of the total data traffic in the last 3 months, an increase from 19 percent in the first 3 months. For each tier, the change in the traffic share in the last 3 months of the study compared to the first 3 months was statistically significant. The shift does not appear to have been related to the introduction of tiered pricing, since the proportions for months 7 though 9 are similar to those of months 4 through 6 (Table 14 and Figure 11).
Table 14.
Data Users % of traffic due to top 1% % of traffic due to top 5% % of traffic due to top 10% % of traffic due to top 20% % of traffic due to the bottom 80% Source: Cisco, 2011
Figure 11.
Although the traffic share of the top tiers may be declining, their volumes continue to increase. For each tier, the increase in the data volume in the 3 months after the pricing change was statistically significant. The lowest 80 percent, not shown in Tables 15 and 16, did not experience significant growth, and did experience a significant slowing of monthly growth rates.
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Table 15.
User Tier
Top 1% Top 5% Top 10% Top 20% All data users All mobile users Source: Cisco, 2011
Table 16.
User Tier
Mobile Users Generated Significantly More Traffic After Pricing Change; Growth Rate Did Not Slow
MB per User per Month 3 Months Before Pricing Change 5,096 2,014 1,325 848 217 114 MB per User per Month 3 Months After Pricing Change 5,687 2,248 1,487 958 243 131 Statistically Significant Increase in Volume? Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Month-to-Month Growth 3 Months Before Pricing Change -1.3% 2.7% 3.6% 4.3% 5.6% 6.1% Month-to-Month Growth 3 Months After Pricing Change 5.8% 4.6% 4.5% 4.4% 3.1% 4.3% Statistically Significant Decline in Growth Rate? No No No No No No
Top 1% Top 5% Top 10% Top 20% All data users All mobile users Source: Cisco, 2011
There are some early signs that tiered pricing is reducing growth in data usage in some segments, such as Android users. However, the overall measures displayed healthy growth with few signs of this growth slowing, and the move to tiered pricing does not appear to have an immediate effect.
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2009 Asia Pacific Cambodia East Timor Fiji Maldives Indonesia Mongolia Bangladesh Guam Laos India Americas Honduras Middle East Afghanistan Yemen World Total 30,012,078 4,829,660 708,481 1,323,113 51,310 21,213 72,087
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
4,509,292 189,798 111,781 101,685 19,798,828 253,657 12,543,435 22,329 373,561 18,251,589
1,134,211
2,632,564
3,061,564
3,320,503
3,465,424
3,567,260
6,560,983
9,603,929 290,615
11,505,810 600,856
12,379,055 718,288
12,748,323 722,749
12,963,246 762,205
47,902,130
77,322,677
94,987,260
106,596,683
113,954,827
137,909,707
Printed in USA
FLGD 09319
02/11
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