How often lately do you hear people say that their social platform of choice – be it Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Google+ – has replaced email and SMS? Well mobile operators will be chagrined to learn they are going to lose US$23bn because of this trend.
According to an upcoming report by Ovum, social messaging is estimated to cost telecom operators over US$23 billion in mobile messaging revenue in 2012.
Neha Dharia, analyst at Ovum and author of the report provisionally titled ‘Counteracting the social messaging threat’ says this year will witness IP based messaging players widening their footprint across the globe.
“Kakao talk is all set to spread beyond South Korea, while whatsapp continues its rapid proliferation across the world and Facebook strengthens its role in mobile communication.
“Telcos have therefore come under pressure to expand their messaging portfolio and offer a range of messaging services beyond SMS.
“In response, telcos have already begun to innovate and offer creative new services to their consumers using the IP channel. Despite telco efforts, the loss due to social messaging will be approximately US$9 billion more than 2011,” Dharia warned.
