Judging from the record number of attendees (70,000+!) at Mobile World Conference in Barcelona, the largest mobile event in the world just last week, it would be safe to say that the dawn of mobile is upon us. Adding to that, last year’s sale of Waze (community based driving navigation) to Google for over a billion dollars, the recent sales of Viber (Internet Based Phone) for over 900 million dollars to a Japanese firm and WhatsApp to Facebook for a mind staggering 19 Billion Dollars is only a testament to the rise of mobile apps.
In the US alone, Internet users are relying more and more on their Smartphone and Tablet apps to gain access to the Internet. The first time that the use of mobile apps to access the Internet surpassed PCs was just last week. Overall, the use of mobile devices was responsible for 55% of total Internet usage in the US in January. The breakdown was dominated by apps at 47% and 8% was from mobile browsers. This was according to data gathered by comScore. PCs on the other hand accounted for 45% of Internet traffic.
Even though this is not the first time mobile usage accounted for more Internet traffic than PCs, it was the first time that the use of Apps alone eclipsed the PC. This shift comes after a massive slowdown in Personal Computer sales, which have been lagging for some time and posted their worst decline ever in 2013.
According to research powerhouse IDC, the adoption of smart devices has increased just under 40%. As apps are optimized for a truly streamlined mobile experience and high-speed access introduced by such technologies as 4G is introduced, this trend will more than likely continue.
In the US market, 55% of the population owned smartphones while 42% had tablets. Just look at the phenomenal growth potential there alone!
Now, with the growth of m-commerce and apps such as PayPal and Google Wallet making the shopping experience fluid, more brick and mortar retailers are getting in the app game.
So, as you can see, the app explosion hasn’t peaked. In fact, it’s just getting started.
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