Vodafone details explosion in smartphone use, sales

The amount of mobile data being used by New Zealanders is exploding, according to Vodafone New Zealand figures.

General manager of networks Tony Baird said this morning that the amount of mobile data traffic on his company’s network had grown from  around 60 terabytes (TB) in the year to June 2010 to 135TB (135,000 gigabytes) for the year to June 2011.

So what are we using our mobiles for?

Facebook.

The social network now accounts for 50% of data traffic on Vodafone’s mobile network (in October, Vodafone introduced an all-you-can-eat $6 Facebook plan for pre-pay users; a post-paid plan followed in April, and unmetered data was included in "intetrated" plans. Before the unmetered Facebook frenzy, email was number one).

The second most popular site is TradeMe.

The third is an adult site that features a lot of video.

Twitter is popular, but doesn't rate on the traffic charts due to most using it for small-footprint text updates.

Smartphone urge
At the same briefing, GM of consumer marketing Kursten Shalfoon said that 66% of Vodafone customers are now buying smartphones.

More stats:  40% of small office/home office and small-to-medium business customers have smartphone

As do 44% of government and corporate users.

However, only around half have coupled their smartphone with a smartphone plan. Vodafone sees the need for more education. NBR sees the need for lower mobile data pricing.

A spokeswoman for Telecom said in the third quarter of the company’s 2011 financial year, 20% mobile sales were smartphones (NBR is awaiting clarification of which models the company defines as “smart”).

A 2degrees spokesman said the company would not disclose the percentage of its sales that were smartphones for “competitive reasons,” but did offer that “Smartphones make up 60% of the devices offered by 2degrees today, up from 38% at the beginning of the year.”

Network upgrades
Vodafone is upgrading its network to cope with the smartphone surge.

The carrier plans to have fibre or high capacity microwave linking 80% of its cellsites to its main network as part of an ongoing programme to replace 2Mbit/s links with 1Gbit/s (1000Mbit/s) connections.

Subject to success at spectrum auctions following the analogue TV switch off, the company also plans to upgrade its network to LTE, aka “4G” technology.

Rise of the machines
The 4G/LTE upgrade should mean faster mobile data, but some of the extra bandwidth will also be used for extra capacity. That is, packing more customers, onto each cellsite.

The big news here is the rise of the machines – devices such as smart power meters that have their own SIM card.

Extrapolating global projections of internet-connected machines, Vodafone sees around 20 million smart devices connecting to its network by 2020, with growth accelerating from 2015. 

Will the machines swamp the network?

No said Mr Baird. Most will be uploading small amounts of data in short bursts.