Juniper Research’s latest report argues that a sharp fall in ringtone revenues will be more than offset by growth in full-track downloads, streamed music services and ringback tones. As a matter of fact, the research company forecasts that global revenues from mobile music services will reach nearly $14.6 billion by 2013!
Juniper has found that many of the key hurdles to mass adoption of full-track services — such as handset form factor, memory constraints, and a reduction of data costs (in some markets, at least) — have been significantly reduced. Mentioned factors along with the increasing willingness of the major labels to participate in mobile ventures and the proliferation of user-generated content in the mobile space, are likely to drive adoption higher.
In the report, Juniper Research awarded some of the industry players for their contribution to the mobile music market. Not surprisingly, Apple scored gold, and is followed by track identification service Shazam, which took silver medal.
More information about Juniper’s report “Mobile Music: Videos, Streamed, Full Tracks, Ringbacks, Ringtones & Downturn Analysis 2009-2013 (5th edition)” is available from their website.