India is going to be driven by a mobile economy. If we are to believe the proliferation of devices and increase in consumer activities, it is going to happen soon. The belief becomes stronger with the study by telecom equipment maker Ericsson - An Ericsson Consumer Insight Summary Report. The report understands the mobile broadband user expectations in India.
For the study Ericsson performed Qualitative research with 18 mobile broadband users across 3 cities (Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore), On-device mobile measurements and Consumer perception survey. For the Consumer perception survey, over 2000 smartphone users, of whom 85 percent use mobile broadband, from the panel spread across 15 cities in India were interviewed to understand perceptions built around mobile broadband performance.
We have listed below 11 major findings of the report that one should be aware of:
1. In India, the average time spent on apps has increased 63 percent in the past 2 years, and the time spent on smartphones has increased 20 percent
2. Indians spend over 3 hours a day on their smartphones, and 25 percent of consumers check their phones over 100 times a day
3. Facebook and WhatsApp are among the top two apps that almost every Indian smartphone user indicates they cannot live without
4. 24 percent of smartphone owners use mobile apps such as WhatsApp and WeChat for business purposes
5. 33 percent of smartphone users say that mobile broadband access has helped them make their business more visible by enabling access to mobile apps
6. 61 percent of smartphone users browse the internet on their phones before they start their day
7. On-device mobile measurement research showed that a mobile broadband smartphone user does not have access to the network 44 percent of the time
8. Social media, browsing and app downloads still drive bulk of mobile broadband data traffic today
9. Although smartphone users are consuming more videos, 44 percent state they often do not watch mobile videos due to lengthy delays when loading
10. 65 percent of users said that they prefer video streaming to downloading videos on their phones, 4 out of every 10 videos they play have issues with buffering and stalling, lasting from seconds to minutes
11. Satisfied users spent 42% more time streaming online videos via apps compared to unsatisfied users
The Ericsson report clearly shows that if the infrastructure improves, the consumption needs will only increase by driving business for all. Good network performance will influence consumer perception and in turn shape smartphone behavior.
