Publications
Partners
This is according to research firm Gartner, which has said that by 2018 more than half of all people who access the internet will do so first on a mobile device.
"The use pattern that has emerged for nearly all consumers, based on device accessibility, is the smartphone first as a device that is carried when mobile, followed by the tablet that is used for longer sessions, with the PC increasingly reserved for more-complex tasks," said Van Baker, Gartner research vice president.
In developing countries such as South Africa, the mobile-first posture will be particularly acute, while in developed countries like the US, households will become "multi-device" environments, Gartner research said.
But Baker went further as he predicted that the shift to mobile will incorporate wearable technology as people increasingly employ smart devices in their personal regimes such as health activities.
Wearables
"This behaviour will adapt to incorporate wearables as they become widely available for users. As voice, gesture and other modalities grow in popularity with consumers, and as content consumption tasks outweigh content creation tasks, this will further move users away from the PC," Baker said.
This view jells with studies from Forrester Research which found that US consumers are widely expected to adopt wearable technology, leading to 10 million users for the Apple Watch alone in 2015.
Forrester further claims that nearly half of Americans and a third of Europeans accept wearable technologies to monitor health or fitness goals.
In addition to the expansion of smart device expansion, the cost will decline, said Gartner, as the researchers said that 75% of new smartphone buyers will pay less than $100 for a new device by 2018.
Predictions suggest that smart wearables like this Samsung Galaxy Gear S will see widespread adoption. (Duncan Alfreds, Fin24)
"New buyers in these regions are rapidly transitioning to utility and basic smartphones, helped by declining average selling prices (ASPs). By contrast, the premium smartphone category has reached saturation levels as demand is mainly driven by replacement users and has begun to slow down," said the company of adoption in developing countries.
Gartner numbers indicate that handset manufactures targeting the lower price segment have seen success.
"Huawei smartphone sales grew 85.3% in the fourth quarter of 2013 to maintain the No 3 spot year over year. Huawei has moved quickly to align its organisation to focus on the global market. Huawei's overseas expansion delivered strong results in the fourth quarter of 2013, with growth in the Middle East and Africa, Asia/Pacific, Latin America and Europe," said Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner.
Price drop
According to results from the IDC, PC sales were slightly up in 2014, with sales mainly in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Palestine and Afghanistan.
"The Middle East and Africa PC market brought seven successive quarters of year-on-year declines to a halt in Q2 2014, posting long-awaited annual growth of 2.2% to total 4.5 million units," industry firm the IDC said.
But the results should be seen against near-exponential growth in smartphones - especially lower cost devices in developing countries.
Mobile operators are pushing to reduce the cost of smartphones, but said that it was a significant challenge to expanding the smart ecosystem.
"The first thing is that at this moment in time, there just isn't a data enabled 3G device for less than about $30. That's really the problem," MTN Group President Sifiso Dabengwa previously told Fin24.
"You want to drive down your low-cost device to as low as possible. Currently we're buying a device for about $40, and it's retailing for just under R600 in terms of Android devices," added Shameel Joosub, Vodacom Group CEO.
Watch Sifiso Dabengwa explain why subsidies harm the mobile industry.
- Follow Duncan on Twitter
