Sure, there’s a recession out there, but that doesn’t mean some segments of the market won’t grow. As a matter of fact, Juniper Research argues that revenues from streamed mobile music services and full-track downloads are expected to exhibit strong growth over the next five years. To put this into numbers, combined revenues from these two type of services are set to increase from $2.5 billion in 2009, to nearly $5.5 billion in 2013.
Among the factors that will drive the uptake are greater variety of applications and content, all-inclusive data packages, easier to use UIs, and an increase in handset storage capacity.
On the other side, Juniper said that those music services which rely on advertising are set to experience a shortfall in revenues, following a global reduction in advertising budgets. Under the worst case scenario, the research company says that ad spend could reach just 50% of pre-downturn estimates.
Other findings from the report include:
- Ringback tone revenues will exceed those of ringtones by 2010 as service adoption increases outside Asia;
- The Far East & China region will account for the largest share of mobile music revenues throughout the 2009-2013 forecast period, followed by Western Europe;
- Aggregators must expand the depth and breadth of their portfolios beyond ringtones if they are to remain competitive.
More information about Juniper’s study titled “Mobile Music: Videos, Streamed, Full Tracks, Ringbacks, Ringtones & Downturn Analysis 2009-2013 (5th edition)” is available from their website.