2012 Global Digital Economy - The E-Commerce and M-Commerce Landscape

M-Commerce ignites e-commerce sector

BuddeComm’s annual publication: Global Digital Economy – The E-Commerce and M-Commerce Landscape, provides the key global insights and statistics for these exciting growing and evolving sectors.

The global e-commerce market has been recently invigorated by the growing use of smart phones leading to a fast growth in mobile commerce. E-Commerce and m-commerce have become very important areas of focus for mobile operators, IT, Internet media players, financial institutions, retail, and payment processing firms alike.

With so many interested parties, the sector has become very competitive and created a heady mix of industry activity. A number of key developments have occurred, particularly in the mobile digital wallet space and with websites which offer “deals of the day”. Other social media models such as Facebook Credits and Pinterest may also offer future e-commerce opportunities. Mobile and online banking also continue to rise in popularity.

The enormous success of smart phones is linked to the availability of amazing and useful Apps and increasingly we will see commercial models being linked to these apps, including the ongoing incorporation of advertising into these servcies. These trends will result in a further spectacular growth in m-commerce.

The increasing use of mobile devices and its importance to the growing m-commerce sector have been recognised in a recent buzzword termed SoLoMo, which describes the importance of Social (interaction), Location (based services) and Mobile (device usage) to this sector.

What we are seeing is a converging of devices, technology, industries and applications - and m-commerce and e-commerce can only benefit from such game-changing trends.

Market Highlights

• The global mobile broadband industry as a whole has become an incredible spectacle to observe, from the many competitors vying for position; the amazing apps streaming into the market; the introduction of new devices and a looming spectrum and infrastructure crunch – we finally have a mobile broadband sector worth talking about.
• It was not long ago that BuddeComm was still lamenting the fact that mobile broadband revenues (excluding SMS) generated not more than 3-5% of mobile industry revenues. However with the introduction of new hardware that includes iPhones and Android smartphones - combined with capped data charges has meant we can finally see revenue increasing as uptake grows.
• While some observers warn against the dominance of successful international companies such as Google, Apple, Facebook, eBay, Twitter, Skype, PayPal etc; the reality is that they are showing the potential opportunities for e-commerce and m-commerce - rather than preventing others from operating in these markets.
• Companies should become far more active in the e-commerce field themselves in order to profit from the enormous business opportunities that are becoming available.
• Online banking continues to grow in popularity with North American and European users the most prolific; however security issues and cyber attacks still tarnish the industry.
• The mobile internet has matured sufficiently to offer new opportunities in areas such as m-commerce, e-trade, social networking and collaboration.
• The overall size of the m-commerce market continues to grow into billions of dollars.
• Mobile payments revenue in Kenya grew 43% in 2011/12.
• E-commerce in Latin America and the Caribbean is booming, with B2C spending up by 43% in 2011 and by at least another 26% in 2012.

Data in this report is the latest available at the time of preparation and may not be for the current year.