Countdown to Mobile Moment - When Will Mobile Phone Accounts Outnumber Humans? I say July 2013 (we are at 6.7B already)

So its that monster year not just in mobile and tech, but in human history. We will experience the Mobile Moment this year, 2013. The moment in time when human evolution reaches the point, where a single consumer gadget exceeds the total human population by users. So we are now counting down to yes, the moment when mobile phone accounts, or 'subscriptions' or some may say 'users' or 'mobile phones' will exceed the total human population alive. Not measured in household penetration rates, nor of adults, but measured in total humans alive.

Never in human history has any gadget or technology achieved 100% penetration levels. Not cars, not motorbikes and mopeds, not even bicycles. Not the Walkman, not the CD player, not the television, Playstation, VCR, DVD player nor even radio. Not the PC, not the internet. Not even such basic necessities we all expect, like running water or electricity. The wristwatch may have seemed ubiquitous, but it wan't. It never reached every wrist. The pen and paper technology, basic pencils, do not reach the total human population because still 800 million adults on the planet are illiterate and have no use for such a technology. But even illiterate humans, beyond the reach of electricity are using mobile phones today. (yes in many parts of Africa and Asia and Latin America, schools provide free recharging service for mobile phones, as an incentive to have the parents send the kids to schoo. and get their phones recharged, for those living in villages and farms that don't have electricity)

But mobile. Mobile reached 6.7 Billion active accounts/subscriptions last year by December 2012, and grew from a little over 6 Billion, adding over 650 million new accounts ie grew new paying users by 11% in just one year. (Isn't this an awesome industry, the fastest-growing Trillion-dollar industry in human history, and the epicenter of all digital convergence). And how, this year, we will definitely add at least another 600 million, probably even more than that. So this is the historic year, when we will have the 'Mobile Moment'. A gadget or technology will grow to become bigger than total human population. Mobile accounts already are bigger than the populations of Europe, Oceania, Latin America, the Middle East and even North America. Asia is almost at 100% and Africa will reach 100% penetration rate level well before this decade is done (they are already past 70% penetration rate). Leading countries are past 200% like the UAE and Hong Kong.

So now we are on the countdown to the Mobile Moment. When will it happen? My current projections say it will happen in July of 2013. The planet is at 7.07 Billion humans and we are at 6.71 Billion mobile subscriptions now in January 2013. We are growing new mobile accounts at a rate of about 54 million per month.

Now, remember, the total mobile subscription count is not the same as actual mobile phones in use (that is less, as some will have multiple accounts but use one phone, and do the SIM-card-switch between different carriers/operators to save in costs or optimize in telecoms traffic behavior). Also remember, because some of us have two phones, and others who have one phone have more than one account, and as some of the mobile accounts are actually machine-accounts (electric meters, watering irrigation systems, healthcare warning systems etc) the actual number of 'unique users' as human beings is well below that magical number. But these are the numbers at the end of 2012:

MOBILE SUBCRIBERS, PHONES, AND USERS AT END OF 2012
Planet . . . . . . . . . . 7.1 Billion humans
Mobile accounts . . . 6.7 Billion total active subscriptions (94% of all humans)
Phones in use . . . .  5.2 Billion including those with 2 phones (73% of all humans)
Unique users . . . . . 4.3 Billion humans who have at least one phone and account (60% of all humans)
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

Lets see as the numbers start to come in. I expect some analysts to jump on the mobile moment number earlier, and also, that as we'll hit the 7.0 Billion active accounts number before technically passing human population count at almost 7.1 Billion, we may see the seven billion number celebrated around May or June.

But yes, this is the monster number coming this year. It will be widely reported and a lot of pundits will give their commentary on fhis pervasive technology. So a few quick thoughts - most of those phones in use are not smartphones (only 1.1 Billion were at the end of last year). The number 1 used service on those mobile devices is no longer voice calls, it is SMS text messaging. More than two out of three phones in use is a cameraphone so for most humans on the planet, the only camera they have ever used, was on a phone, not a stand-alone Canon or Nikon or Olympus haha..

As to services, more than a third of these mobile phone users access the internet on their phones at least part of the time and nearly a third access news on their phones. 60% of mobile phone owners have received advertising on their phones already so mobile is becoming the biggest advertising platform by reach, totally dwarfing television, print and the PC based legacy internet, and rivalled only by radio anymore. And yes, obviously, all data in this blog may be freely shared and re-used and translated and turned into infographics etc.. Please provide links back here if you do and also tell me via Twitter - I am @tomiahonen of course - and I'll tweet links to your articles that talk about these numbers.

I'll be giving you a lot more data on the mobile industry as we near the publication date for the brand new TomiAhonen Almanac 2013 edition, but if you wanted all the mobile data in an ebook/mbook that you can save on your tablet, laptop or smartphone - now's the time to order the TomiAhonen Almanac 2012. Anyone who buys the old edition now, gets the new edition also, for the same low price of ony 9.99 Euros. A great value on the 180 page statistical compendium of all major mobile industry stats. So check out the TomiAhonen Almanac 2012.

 

Comments

[Sander van der Wal]

Stone tools are technology too. And they were mobile.

[Kevin]

That's kind of an unfair comparison in your second paragraph. If you're saying pencil-and-paper penetration is below 100% on the grounds that some people can't read, you can't then turn around and claim mobile penetration is >100% because some people have more than one phone. A lot of people own multiple pencils too.

[Cassini]

I think you might be underestimating how enormously competitive the pen, pencil and paper are. Also, some rudimentary agricultural staples like rice and corn are so ubiquitous they exist in large numbers.

However, mobile phones are probably the most widely adopted digital technology ever.

[Winter]

Tomi, you forgot the knife and fire as the most ubiquitous technologies ever. And the wheel as a technology used by almost every human in the last century. I think we can safely say that every human who ever lived has hold a knife and used a fire to cook or warm at least at one point in life.

But on the other hand, a new technology that is as ubiquitous as fire, the knife, and the wheel is a breakthrough. Indeed a milestone in human history. The world will never be the same (it never was, but anyhow).

[Winter]

Next milestone: A mobile phone for every tree:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/01/16/amazon_phones/

[geektech]

I think he said gadget, but any way, fire had been remplaced by counter tops, and knife no everybody use them.

Insurance agencies are putting gsm trackers on cars with obdII, and i think news cars come gsm system integration to track faults. Does them count?

[newbie reader]

Here is another weird piece of "analytic" I found recently.

What is smartphone marketshare estimate for 2016 ?

Well, all forecasts for iOS/Android estimate are BS, nobody can foresee it.

However, some knowledge of year 2016 total smartphone marketshares is just common sense.

Consider this: http://mobithinking.com/mobile-marketing-tools/latest-mobile-stats/a#topmobilemarkets

USA pop is about 1/3 of China pop. Number of mobile subscribtions in these countries is currently /2012/ about the same ratio.

Yet, here is IDC "forecast" for 2016 smartphone marketshares:
http://mobithinking.com/mobile-marketing-tools/latest-mobile-stats/a#topsmartphonecountries

Country, 2011 Share, 2012 Share, 2016 forecast
China 18.3% 26.5% 23.0%
USA 21.3% 17.8% 14.5%

so, the forecasted 2016 ratio is about 23/14=1.64, up from 26/17=1.52 in 2012

What kind of "analytics" is that?

[winter]

@newby reader
Just extrapolate a straight line. If you can draw a straight line you have a great future as an analyst.

In three years, India is tail chasing China. USA is somewhere in the back.

[newbie reader]

@winter
// extrapolate a straight line

Well, it looks like for a good career as IDC "analyst", one needs to know very well, whose straight lines are more staright than the others :)

I already did this good example here:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/a/ac/20121117154324!World_Wide_Smartphone_Sales_Share.png
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/a/ac/20121117154332!World_Wide_Smartphone_Sales_Share.png
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/archive/a/ac/20121207175320!World_Wide_Smartphone_Sales_Share.png

Apparently, for a good IDC career, Apple line should be "more straight" than that of Android :)

[Tester]

@John Waclawsky/Duke:

Can you please refrain from spamming non-Nokia blog discussions with your rants? This is clearly off-topic here!

[Tester]

Then please post it in the discussion about Nokia, not in the one about Mobile accounts outnumbering humans.

Here it is indeed offtopic.

[RottenApple]

@John Waclawsky:

I'm sorry, but I have to agree with Tester on this being off-topic. If you can keep this to discussions about Nokia's problems it's ok, albeit still annoying. But here - in a discussion about mobile in general - they have no place and should be considered spamming or trolling.

Furthermore, you are quite the hypocrite. On the one hand you accuse Microsoft of astroturfing, but on the other hand resort to the same tactics to flood these discussions with your Microsoft-hate that goes well beyond the tolerance level of many readers here.

Too bad that the actual discussion about the 'mobile moment' is polluted by all this filth. It might have been an interesting topic.

[Lasko]

@Tester, RottenApple

+1

@John Waclawsky, Doke

I appreciate your effort, but it IS offtopic to this article. 'Nokia' or 'Windows Phone' is not even mentioned in this blog post. If you have anything to say post it to the corresponding article or wait for the next one to arrive.

Moderation requested.

[Pete Austin]

A lot of technologies outnumber people, if you count the individual items: knives, drinking vessels, food plates, shoes, etc..

[newbie reader]

// knives, drinking vessels, food plates, shoes

difference is, all of these could be reproduced by village, or small mediveal city, economy, with no more than some thousands of population. And many could be done by 1 person, or by his family/relatives.

While mobile is 'true advanced' /i.e. complicated, global/ tech.

It requires millions of people, rather advanced knowledge and huge chunk of 20th century level tech. Forget city-level, even most of smaller countries would probably be unable to reproduce it now on their own, even if they try.

[Jeroen]

Stephen Elop in the top 5 worst CEO of 2012 according to CNBC http://www.cnbc.com/id/47030593 (page 3 = about Elop)

[newbie reader]

Japan: Google's Nexus 7 had 44% of the market versus the iPad's 40%

Apple iPad lost the number one in Japan for the first time since 2010

http://www.insidermonkey.com/blog/apple-inc-appl-ipad-loses-out-to-nexus-7-in-japan-37727/

[newbie reader]

USA 2013Q1 consumer demand for iPhone5 drops to pre-release level.

Buyers, who plan to buy iPhone over next 90 days:

sep'11, 65% /iP4S release peak/
dec'11, 54%
mar'12, 56%
jun'12, 50%
sep'12, 71% /iP5 release peak/
dec'12, 50%

plan to buy Samsung phone over next 90 days:
jun'12, 19%
sep'12, 13%
dec'12, 21%

So, if we trust these numbers,
iP5 is losing the battle to Sammy, returning to pre-release lows, on its own weight. SGS4 has not even announced yet.
Also note that higher percentage of iPhone buyers buys older model, compared to iP4S release.

And that funny guy, Baron95, talks about 'less peaky business' here :)

http://www.slashgear.com/changewave-iphone-demand-down-but-still-dominant-15265426/

[Winter]

@John Waclawsky
"Hopefully capitalizing NO ONE WANTS A WINDOWS PHONE OR TABLET isn't bothering you too much. It is meant to annoy the trolls."

Actually, your capitalized soundbite has the effect to "cure" Google searches from the poisoning of the trolls. One primary aim of all the troll comments is to ensure that any critical comments are drowned in "positive" remarks in search results. Your repeated soundbite works as an anti-dote.
;-)

[newbie reader]

Consumer Reports:

iP5 is ranked 3rd for AT&T and Sprint, below SGS3, and is not even in Top 3 for Verizon.

AT&T
1. LG Optimus
2. SGS3
3. iP5

Sprint
1. LG Optimus
2. SGS3
3. iP5

Verizon
1. SGS3
2. HTC One S
3. Note2

T-Mobile
1. Moto Razr Maxx
2. Moto Razr
3. SGS3

/ And my pick would be: Verizon HTC DNA /

http://www.businessinsider.com/consumer-reports-iphone-5-2013-1