Services Are King: Segment Leads Global Consumer Spending on Digital

Of the $2 trillion that consumers spent globally in 2010 on digital information and entertainment products and services, the largest spending segment (62 percent) was for communications subscription-based access and usage services, research firm Gartner reports.

The $1.2 trillion segment includes mobile and wired voice services; mobile data services such as SMS/TXT and broadband; fixed broadband services; video services such as pay TV; and online gaming.

Devices from TVs and game consoles to PCs, smartphones and tablets comprise the second-largest consumer spending category, worth $600 billion globally in 2010 (28 percent of the total).

Spending on content and software comprises just 10 percent of the total, at $200 billion. Half of the content segment consists of video content that has been purchased, rented, streamed, or downloaded, along with premium channels, pay per view, video on demand, and that portion of pay-TV subscriptions that is allocated to licensing fees. The other half of the content segment consists of PC and gaming software, digital music and books, and purchases from mobile apps stores.

Gartner identifies wireless broadband, location-based services, and operating systems as the technology areas that will offer marketers of digital goods and services the most opportunity during the next three years.

Research: 3D TVs, iPads Reach ‘Hype Cycle’ Peak

Industry expectations over 3D home entertainment and media tablets such as Apple’s iPad are approaching their respective peaks, according to a new “hype cycle” forecast by marketing research firm Gartner.

The forecast (via CNET) plots the emerging technologies — along with a host of others, such as private cloud computing — on a modified sine wave curve of industry expectations over time. After reaching the “peak of inflated expectations,” new technologies are generally cast into a “trough of disillusionment” from both consumers and prospective industry participants before ascending a “slope of enlightenment” and prospering on a “plateau of productivity,” Gartner says.

Technologies generally survive the correction of expectations; Gartner estimates both 3D home displays and media tablets are two to five years away from mass adoption.

More on the research firm’s methodology here.

Research: Android Now the Top Smartphone Operating System In U.S.

The Android operating system expanded rapidly in the second quarter of 2010, overtaking Apple’s iPhone OS to become the third-most-popular smartphone system in the world, and passing Research In Motion in the U.S. to become the country’s No. 1 platform, research firm Gartner reports.

“A non-exclusive strategy that produces products selling across many communication service providers, and the backing of so many device manufacturers, which are bringing more attractive devices to market at several different price points, were among the factors that yielded its growth this quarter,” says Gartner’s Carolina Milanesi.

Smartphone sales to end users worldwide totaled 61.6 million units in the second quarter of 2010, a 51% increase from the same period in 2009, with new products from Apple as well as Android phone maker HTC and Motorola driving growth. Smartphone sales accounted for 19% of all mobile device sales worldwide during the quarter, Gartner says.

“The sudden growth in media tablets, such as the Apple iPad, did not appear to hold back smartphone sales,” Milanesi adds. “We believe that most tablet users still feel the need for a truly pocketable, yet highly capable, device for those situations when it’s inconvenient to carry a device with a larger form factor.”

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