Smartphone Flourishing Amid Mobile Broadband Expansion

Smartphone flourishing amid mobile broadband expansion

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News -6th Sept,2016) : The evolution of electronic media has been fast and swift with smartphones playing a major role as its growth is still alive, unlike in developed world.

Millions of people are coming online for the first time in the South Asian region each month, it remains a lucrative market. According to a report, the number of smartphone users in Pakistan is increasing rapidly.

With the introduction of the fastest 3g and 4G-LTE services in Pakistan, the use of mobile broadband is growing. By the end of 2016, there will be more than 40 million smartphone users in the country.

Currently, there are 31.77 million Internet users who are enjoying the third-generation (3G) and fourth-generation (4g) mobile communication services in Pakistan. This number is increasing. Moreover, the mobile subscribers are now 133 million, data issued by Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) revealed.

Based on current trends in e-commerce sector and as per market estimates, more than two million users a month visit the online shopping stores to purchase a cell phone. To gain the advantage from this ever-increasing demand, the major industry players from telecom operators to mobile phone manufacturers and an e-commerce platform have joined hands with the internet giant Google to promote online trade by giving exclusive discounts on phone purchases just ahead of the event of Eid.

The publicly available data shows mobile phone imports regarding the value and not in units making it tough to figure out category wise imports. According to the market experts, less than 20 percent of the mobile phones imported in Pakistan are the smartphones.

But, in the next couple of years, this figure is likely to change. In almost all the online shopping stores in Pakistan, the category of the smartphone is on the top. Grappetite, a mobile app development firm had released an infographics that details the usage patterns of smartphones in Pakistan.

The infographics reveals that 35 % of the smartphone users in Pakistan carries a low cost phone on them for safety reasons while 68 % of the smartphone users in Pakistan are on Android. Similarly, 77 % of smartphone users are just 21 to 30 years old and 60 % of the Pakistani's use more than one cell phone.

Around 16 % smartphone users regularly buy paid apps while remaining 84 % contents with free apps. Mobile is the Primary access platform, and report foresees that over time more expensive devices will see sales grow as those new internet users seek to upgrade their smartphone.