SNL Kagan, a comprehensive resource for financial intelligence in the media and communications sector, has just issued a press release that pretty much confirms what the big wireless providers are counting on... namely that the use of data services will grow astronomically in the coming years. Okay, maybe not astronomically. Here are some of their findings:

• SNL Kagan expects mobile data revenue to increase by a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 16% from $24 billion , in 2007 to over $100 billion in 2017, compared to barely a 5% CAGR for total service revenue over the same period.
• SNL Kagan predicts that by 2017, wireless subscribers will reach 90% per capita penetration. The significance is that as the market nears saturation, wireless providers are relying on the sales of new data services for revenue growth.
• The largest source of mobile data use continues to be messaging and mobile email, with 62% of wireless subscribers utilizing these services by 2017.
• Mobile web users, growing from 18% of wireless subscribers in 2007 to 52% in 2017, will comprise the second-largest category.
• SNL Kagan expects mobile video/TV to ramp the fastest, with a 10-year CAGR of 22.5% versus 12.7% for games and 13.1% for music.

This "good" news should be greeted with a degree of caution. In a recent alert issued by the American College of Emergency Physicians warned of the danger of accidents involving oblivious texters. The ER doctors cite rising reports from doctors around the country of injuries involving text-messaging pedestrians, bicyclists, even Rollerbladers and equestrians. If people don't change their behavior, the CAGR of "mobile-use" related accidents could also grow astronomically.

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