Wireless communications, including mobile entertainment, RFID, mobile banking and cellphone service, continues to be one of the hottest sectors in the InfoTech market.  There were an estimated 5.3 billion global cellular communications subscriptions by mid- 2011, including more than 303 million in the U.S. alone.  (Since some people, particularly in developing nations, have more than one subscription, the number of individual subscribers is somewhat less, an estimated 4.2 billion.  This means that global market penetration is more than 60%.)  The number of subscribers to ultrafast 3G or 4G service is already approximately 1 billion.

New cellphone handsets are selling at a rate of about 1.8 billion yearly—making the cellular phone the fastest-selling single item of consumer electronics by far.  These handsets are purchased by new users (those who are getting cellular service for the first time ever) and by those who are upgrading to newer, more powerful phones.  Most new cellphones carry numerous advanced features.  More MP3-capable cellphones are sold each year than stand-alone MP3 music players.  More digital camera-equipped cellphones are sold than stand-alone digital cameras.  In addition, new cellphones are often Internet-capable, and increasingly able to take advantage of high speed access.

Cellular service companies have been investing heavily in an effort to improve coverage and service.  A good example in the U.S. is the fact that the nation is covered by more than 250,000 cellular telephone towers.

Total U.S. wireless service company revenues were about $159.9 billion in 2010, according to CTIA-The Wireless Association (Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association), up from about $152.6 billion 2009.  Approximately 96% of Americans had a cellphone subscription at year-end 2008 (up from only 79% at the end of 2006).  They spend an average of about $50.00 monthly on their cellphone bills.  (In 1998, the average monthly bill was $98.02, but intense competition forced prices to plummet.)  Advanced services, such as text messaging, Internet access and access to entertainment including videos and games, make up a growing portion of that monthly bill.  U.S. text messages via cellphones total in the trillions each year.

Cellphones continue to replace traditional landlines in U.S. homes.  As of the beginning of 2011, 26.6% of households have cellphones only, up from only 17.5% two years earlier.

Meanwhile, mobile shopping is a prime growth area in the e-commerce sector.  Also, America’s government has long term plans to free up federal and commercial wireless spectrum that is currently allocated to various uses, but remains under utilized.  This could pave the way for future growth of the wireless industry.

Worldwide, cellphone use continues to experience extremely rapid growth, particularly in China, Africa and India.  China is nearing 1 billion cellphone subscriptions.  In emerging nations, cellphone service is bargain priced.  Handsets are particularly low priced in some regions.  For example, Nokia recently launched cellphones with a good level of features designed for the African market at $15.00—a non-subsidized price.  In some nations, particularly in Scandinavia, market penetration exceeds 100% of the population as many people have more than one cellphone subscription.  Globally, cellphone-based game playing and mobile entertainment such as music and video continue to make great strides.  Cellphones are rapidly becoming banking and payment devices, particularly in Japan, Korea and parts of Europe; that trend will move to the U.S. over the mid-term.  (In some cases, this is done by using a technology known as nearfield communications to enable cellphones as payment devices when near a cash register or vending machine—somewhat like some credit cards do today at gasoline stations.)  Mobile banking is one of the most popular services for cellphone owners in the emerging world, as wireless innovation is bringing banking services to remote areas for the first time ever.

The wireless world incorporates a great deal more than cellphones, ranging from satellite-based services and Wi-Fi hotspots to remote wireless sensor networks (WSNs) and vast wireless Wi-Fi networks on corporate and college campuses.  Whether it is access through Bluetooth, the fast data transfer speeds of upstart ultrawideband (UWB), satellite, cellphone or Wi-Fi, consumers and business users alike are becoming more and more reliant on wireless-based services and devices in their daily tasks.  There is no end in sight to the rapid acceleration of wireless.

There are certain things you can count on when considering the wireless market over the mid-term:

a)      The total wireless market and the number of uses for wireless connections will continue to grow rapidly, even though market penetration of individual cellphone subscribers is reaching extremely high levels on a global basis.  Analysts at LM Ericsson forecast 50 billion wirelessly-connected devices by 2020.  M2M, or machine-to-machine communications, will be a major growth factor.

b)      Cellphones will continue to morph into ever more complex, multi-purpose personal communication devices (including the growing use of the cellphone as a financial transaction device).  Cellphone circuitry will become much more powerful, piggybacking off the revolution in ultra-fast, multi-processor power in handheld game machines.  The amount of storage in cellphones for data, photos, video and entertainment will continue to increase dramatically.  Batteries for wireless devices will become much stronger, while chips will become more energy efficient.

c)      Although cellphone markets are well established in the U.S. and in major developed nations everywhere, nonetheless the number of subscribers continues to grow in these countries.  In the U.S., the newest subscribers tend to be those on lower-cost plans, or accounts set up by parents for their children.

d)      Meanwhile, hundreds of millions of cellphone subscribers will be added in short order in less developed nations worldwide.  Fort example, millions of new cellphone subscriptions are opened in India every month.

e)      There is no end to the ways to make money out of wireless trends.  For example, look at the rapidly growing market for cellphone applications or “apps.”

f)       Ever-better, higher-speed, longer-distance standards will continue to emerge and be fully developed for wireless network access.  Ultra-high speed LTE is quickly gathering advocates, as is HSDPA.  Download speeds on the most advanced cellular networks are already in the range of 7.2 megabits per second (Mbps), and 14 Mbps will be available on many networks after additional infrastructure investment.

g)      Security issues such as eavesdropping on Bluetooth conversations, hacking into Wi-Fi networks and viruses spread among cellphones will require more attention and investment from the technology and telecommunications sectors.

h)      RFID (radio frequency ID tags used to track inventory) will continue rapid adoption by manufacturers, logistics centers, shippers and retailers.  This is thanks largely to an early initiative by Wal-Mart to require its largest suppliers to use RFID to wirelessly transmit data from cases of merchandise.  Second and third-generation RFID will eliminate most of the disappointments of earlier RFID implementations.

i)        The Apple iPhone sets the standard for consumer expectations for smartphone handsets.  However, the Android operating system, launched by Google, has higher market share on smartphones than the iPhone operating system.

j)        Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) will proliferate, providing exciting new ways to gather environmental and industrial data, and to foster home automation and monitoring.

k)      “Contactless payment” systems, utilizing nearfield communications to wirelessly debit or charge accounts by waving a cellphone at a cash register or vending machine will grow quickly.

l)        The cellphone industry is relatively immune to dips in the economy, as consumers consider their mobile communications to be as basic a need as transportation.

m)    The immense success of Apple’s iPad, a lightweight, “tablet” computer, has introduced an entirely new type of platform for wireless access to the Internet.  Meanwhile, virtually all of the world’s leading computer makers have scrambled to offer their own tablets, many of them based on Google’s Android operating system.  This is excellent news for cellular service providers, as many consumers rely on both Wi-Fi, when available, and cellular service for connectivity.