Mobile Data: 'Tools for Business Efficiency, Money Spinning for Operators'

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oice and data are the key tools in the mobile world, however for Nigeria the trend has been tilted more to favour voice but some operators have been keying into the pontentials of mobile data. Ahead of the Mobile World Congress 2015, the key drivers for mobile data were examined along the money spinning opportunities.  

IN THE last few years across the global, mobile data has become the trend in the telecoms industry following the evolution of several value added services in the mobile services sector as well as the development of an electronic driven financial services economy.

In Nigeria, the trend just began in the early 2000 following the licensing of mobile telephone operators to run the Global System for Mobile communication.

Since then, the industry has been largely driven by voice with little attention being paid to huge potentials of the mobile data for a country that has been captured as the fastest growing in Africa.

The pitiable result was recently reflected in a mobile money report, which rated low, the adoption of mobile money by the Nigerians despite the growing awareness in the economy.

The report revealed that Nigeria has a huge addressable market and a large number of mobile money deployments, but low levels of adoption and usage. And this is just one aspect where mobile data is expected to play a key role.

The report, which was published by Mondato, a mobile financial services industry research and advisory company listed Nigeria among the countries in West Africa where the adoption of mobile money is still at infancy.

Deployments of mobile money have been on the increase of recent as several partnerships between the financial services companies and the mobile operators have been signed.

Access Bank Plc recently entered into an agreement with Airtel Nigeria for the deployment of its mobile money platform, Access Money.

In July 2014, MTN Nigeria launched the MTN Diamond Yellow account, offering mobile financial services in partnership with Diamond Bank.

Also Globacom launched Glo Exchange, a mobile money super-agent network that

created 500,000 mobile money agent outlets in the country through the Glo Xchange, Globacom in partnership with Firstmonie, a subsidiary of First Bank, Ecobank, Stanbic IBTC and Zenith Bank.

A study conducted by a Nigerian research company, NOI Polls, showed that only six of 10 Nigerians know about the mobile money, which is 59 percent while only 13 percent use it.

The responses showed that majority of the 93 per cent operate such accounts in connection with their bank account, while only seven per cent operate their mobile money account separately.

The poll also revealed that 65 per cent use for funds transfer, 54 per cent for bill payment, 36 per cent for money withdrawal and 25 per cent for payment of purchased goods and services.

The opinion poll, conducted between August 5 and 7, 2013, involved telephone interviews of a random nationwide sample. 1004 randomly selected phone-owning Nigerians aged 18 years and above, representing the six geopolitical zones in the country,

While the growth in terms of embrace mobile money still appears to be at its infancy due to its challenges as reported by Mondato, critical apps to drive mobile data is however also at its lowest ebb.

President of the Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria, Engr Lanre Ajayi in an interview with National Mirror expressed worry over the lack of apps and content to drive mobile data in the country when broadband access becomes abundant in Nigeria.

According to him, the country is in dire needs of local apps and content to drive mobile data saying that the absence of such will amounts to waste of whatever broadband access increase that the country will experience this year.

And ahead of the Mobile World Congress 2015, which will be held on March 2-5 in Barcelona, Gartner, the worlds renowned market intelligence revealed that there are going to be key drivers of mobile data that will become money spinners for operators to key into.

According to Gartner, there are key factors that will drive the growth in mobile data traffic adding that communications service providers, CSPs and mobile app developers will lead the market.

Research Director at Gartner, Jessica Ekholm said that mobile data traffic will continue to show double-digit growth in 2015 noting that Gartner expects traffic to grow by 59 percent this year.

Gartner revealed that there will be newer and faster networks, a rise in the number of users of these networks, and more affordable 3G and 4G handsets will help to increase data traffic.

It however, said that the key driver of data growth on a global scale is mobile apps, particularly mobile video apps stressing that network speed and reliability are priorities for many mobile customers, it is really apps and content that are driving traffic volumes as people increasingly chat to friends and family, watch videos on the move, and listen to streamed music.

Gartner predicted that although 4G service prices are likely to fall to 3G levels to make them more affordable, 3G networks will continue to fuel worldwide data growth during the next five years.

“We predict that, in 2018, half of North American mobile connections will use 4G networks, but in the Middle East and Africa 4G users will amount to only 3.5 percent of the region's total. We expect 3G connections to grow by 45.7 percent globally in 2015. This double-digit growth shows the longevity and importance of 3G networks”, the report said.

Gartner further revealed that the availability of more affordable 4G handsets is also fuelling growth in data traffic saying that the increase in affordable 4G-enabled handsets and 4G services, which are becoming priced on par with 3G services, will collectively boost traffic.

For 2018, Gartner predicted that 4G users will generate 46 percent of all mobile data traffic explaining that this is because, by 2018, each 4G smartphone will use nearly 5.5GB of data per month, which is three times more than a 3G smartphone.

On what mobile apps will drive double-digit growth over the next few years, it was revealed that mobile video is by far the biggest driver of mobile data.

According to the global market intelligence group, data that was collected from various mobile providers suggested that mobile video is generating 50 percent of all mobile data saying that it expects video streaming to account for over 60 percent of mobile data traffic in 2018, as consumers increase the number of videos they watch and upload.

Gartner observed that fast, uninterrupted, video experiences encourage people to increase their video usage stressing that the growth in the number of users of video-calling services is also noteworthy.

In terms of traffic, Gartner said five minutes of 3G FaceTime video calling uses up to 15MB of data adding that there are many users, of which the collective total amount can be large.

In addition,

The report further revealed that mobile music streaming can easily generate hundreds of megabytes of data, but this varies greatly between mobile music apps for example, a user actively listening to music may consume more than twice as much data as a user of Pandora.

On what should CSPs and mobile app developers do to harness this growth, Gartner suggested that the amount of time consumers spend on the Internet, whether via mobile phone, tablet or PC, will continue to increase.

And as such CSPs will need to focus on creating new pricing with a focus on data access, such as shared plans saying that they will also need to refine the services they already provide, with a focus on creating richer, more immersive and more personalised experiences, to increase their customer numbers.

“As the mobile app market matures, app developers will have to sharpen their focus on the marketing and transparency of their apps, in order to retain customers”, the report.

 Gartner's research indicated that although affluent people and traditional early adopters are the leading users of new technologies and devices, younger, less wealthy people make greater use of mobile apps.

It observed further that young people's greater acceptance of apps and mobile content will require app developers to adjust their techniques to address the differences between user groups saying that the future will be tough for CSPs and mobile app developers that decide not to upgrade the user experiences they deliver on their services and products while the winners will be those providers best able to satisfy consumers' demand for high data use, while maintaining their margins.

MTN Nigeria became the first mobile operator in Nigeria to key into this unique opportunity this year when it launched the BetterMe Apps, an all embracing apps that explores the power and accessible via PCs and mobile devices.