The UK Ringtone Wireless Market Worth Over £60m

According to a new study and analysis by NOPWorld (UK) in conjunction with Mobile Metrix (Sweden) the UK ring-tone market is worth over £60m per annum. Adults aged 15-34 spent £49.2m on logos per annum for their handsets and £90m per annum on SMS alerts. Colin Strong, Director of Mobile research at NOP comments "We would expect this to be significantly higher when taking into account kids spending (aged below 15 years)".

The study found that 32% of adults aged 15-34 years had purchased a ring-tone in the last three months, 21% had purchased logos and 20% had purchased SMS alerts. Whilst these figures are encouraging, take-up of services that are higher revenue generating for network operators was much lower with just 9% of 15-34 year olds having used e-mail to their mobile phone and 7% having played an SMS or WAP game.

One of the significant findings from the research is that the distribution channel for mobile services is very fragmented with no one player dominating. It also becomes clear that operators are by no means dominating the supply of mobile content and services with typically single digit shares for services such as ring-tones. According to Edward Nugent, Mobile Metrix the situation is unlikely to change as the entry barrier to provide mobile services is reducing and more players are entering the fray. Even though the market for mobile services is growing the fragmented nature of the distribution means that more players are sharing the revenue.

According to Nugent one of the most significant findings was the preference stated by consumers as to where they wished to buy mobile services. While half had no preference 54% of those that did express a preference stated retail outlets. This suggests that convenience can play an important part in the sales of mobile services.

Significantly over 60% prepay customers prefer retail outlet whilst network operators are preferred by only 10%. Interestingly preference to purchase from the network operator rises to 30% for post-paid users. So the more affluent the user, the more the retail channel is preferred. Colin Strong comments "The retail channel has proven to be a difficult one for the selling of these sorts of services. With the introduction of much better and higher value mobile services such as arcade games, polyphonic ring-tones the potential of this channel clearly needs to be developed.

It is clear that if mobile operators wish to dominate in the provision of mobile services to consumer they need to radically rethink their strategy. As in most industries the battle is in the distribution part of the value chain.

This Press Release Sponsored by AGILENT TECHNOLOGIES

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he study found that 32% of adults aged 15-34 years had purchased a ring-tone in the last three months, 21% had purchased logos and 20% had purchased SMS alerts. Whilst these figures are encouraging, take-up of services that are higher revenue generating for network operators was much lower with just 9% of 15-34 year olds having used e-mail to their mobile phone and 7% having played an SMS or WAP game.

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