3G growth fuels Western European mobile portal demand

vnunet.com reports on a new study from IDC, which "predicts that the western European mobile portal market will increase to around 74 million users by 2010, representing a compound annual growth rate of 10 per cent."

Rosie Secchi at IDC said, "Since 2004, other interesting developments have taken place in the mobile industry regarding mobile portal usage and content. Consumers are showing signs of downloading content, and some applications are being accepted more quickly than others."

Secchi added, "To sustain growth in terms of both users and usage, mobile operators must introduce more dynamic and interactive mobile portal content and evolve the offering to ensure that it continues to be compelling and personalised."

IDC predicted "the globalisation of branding and services will lead to a rise in pan-European players operating across multiple regions and countries." Secchi said, "This new trend is seeing the biggest network operators in Europe battling for markets, further emphasising how important it is for a mobile operator to own its customers, thus providing value through branding, sponsorship, content and effective marketing."