This popped up in my feeds today, quite interesting to note how mobile computing and networks are becoming the dominant technology.
Telecom infrastructure vendor Ericsson came out with some interesting numbers: 85% of the world will see 3G/4G in 2017.
Gigaom has an interesting infographic showing the numbers in interesting light – 
The Ericsson – Traffic and Market Report for June 2012 states that “85 percent of the world’s population will have internet coverage via 3G by 2017 and there will be close to nine billion mobile subscriptions”.
Some elements of the data I found impressive:
India and China, currently have 1.9 billion connection and have added 64 million connections in the first quarter of 2012. These are stupendous numbers, indicating that Asia and to extend a little, the BRIC nations will become the largest consumer of mobile technology – hardware, software and services.
Another interesting projection is that by 2017 there will be 9 billion mobile connections, and one third of them will be smart phones. So essentially, a large portion of the population will have a mobile computing platform that they carry on their person – a huge shift in the way we think about phones, computers and mobile computing in general. More access to 3G and LTE networks will only hasten the shift away from ‘desktop/laptop/notebook’ computers.
Are we ready for it?
