Asia's mobile market: Growing or not?

This is really the interesting part of market research when one is able to compare numbers from different companies about the same issue or topic and those numbers contradict each other. It is even more interesting, when the contradicting news comes from the same company.

IDC says that "Asia's mobile industry is the fastest growing subscriber market in the world. "The momentum has been strong, up close to 26 percent. And mainly it has been due to India, which has a very fast-growing market last year," said Ms. Wong. "The subscribers there doubled to 48 million. But at the same time China, the Philippines and Thailand were very significant contributors to that growth."

Ms. Wong says that if trends continue, the Asian subscriber numbers could exceed nine hundred million by 2009, nearly double the number of subscribers in 2004."

Great - but wasn't it just a couple of weeks ago that they said that the mobile market is expected to slow down?

This is the thing with market research that interviews people, companies or retailers. Responding on the spot, many respondents don't actually respond the way they will then act when confronted with the real situation. Sure, I can say I am going to buy a phone in 6 months time, but if I do it or not doesn't bother me in the end - I might or might not buy one in 6 months. By then, the research company has moved on already. Okay - I admit, there are ways to rectify this but I am not going to discuss this here and now. I just look forward to the next set of numbers in another months or two.

(By Asia Business Consulting)