Computers in the U.S.

November 29, 2011 — The Editors

The steady rise in demand for computers and electronic computing devices in the United States appears, when charted, as a line moving in exactly the opposite direction as the domestic production and shipments of these same products. This is an industry (NAICS 334111) that highlights a trend towards increasing consumption of a product and declining production of the same which feeds the U.S. trade imbalance. But that leads us to complex questions we don’t really want to address here. Here, we present market sizes and today’s is based on the value of Electronic Computer Manufacturing in the United States in 2000 and 2010 as well as the value of net imports of the same products in 2000 and the forecasted value for 2010.

Geographic reference: United States
Year: 2000 and 2010
Market size: U.S. manufacturing $69.3 and $27.9 billion
Market size: Net imports $89.4 and $199.3 billion
Source: Computer value of shipments from Annual Survey of Manufactures 1997, and the 2002 Economic Census. Net imports of Electric and electronic equipment from Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2000. Net imports of Computers and electronic products from Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2012.
Posted on November 29, 2011

Posted in Computing, Information Technology, Machinery, Mobile Devices, National Infrastructure. No Comments »

Headphone Market

November 21, 2011 — The Editors

The arrival of a new, high-end, expensive and very fashionable headphone has stirred up the market for headphones. Headphones are a reasonably mature product segment which was infused with energy over recent years by earbuds that are commonly used with MP3 players of all sorts as well as cell phones and other small recording dvices. But it was the arrival on the scene of the headphone, Beats by Dr. Dre, that reenvigorated the market most recently, the sales of which account for nearly a quarter of the market size listed below. Celebrity meets audio equipment and the market expands. Increased hearing loss in adolescents may be part of the unseen price being paid.

Geographic reference: United States
Year: 2011
Market size: $2 billion
Source: “Headphones With Swagger (and Lots of Bass),” The New York Times, page B1, Sunday, November 20, 2011, available online here. Also, “One in Five U.S. Adolescents Has Hearing Loss, Researchers Find,”
Bloomberg.com, August 17, 2010, available online here.
Original source: NPD Group and Journal of the American Medical Association
Posted on November 21, 2011

Posted in Audio & Video Equipment, Entertainment, Mobile Devices, Music. No Comments »

MHealth

September 6, 2011 — The Editors

The term “mHealth” is one being used to help define a category of medical services and devices and a growing part of the health care industry. It stands most simply for mobile health care, more fully “emerging mobile communications and network technology for healthcare.”

This market encompasses the use of mobile techology in the service of providing health care. It includes all those applications which combine body sensors with mobile or static devices designed to monitor a patient’s vital signs or some specific bodily function. The infrastructure behind these devices is also part of the category. An example of such a device is an electrode patch which may be worn by a patient and automatically send the monitoring center information about the patient while he or she is on-the-go. The information is sent by a tiny radio transmitter build into the epidurmal electronic device.

Today’s market size is the estimated size of the market for mHealth products in 2010 and a forecast for the size in 2014. Please note, however, that this market has yet to be well defined and as a result various research firms have come up with widely disparate projections of its size. The source listed below provides a link to an article explaining this problem more fully, titled “mHealth predictions: $1.9B, $4.4B, $4.6B?” Defining the market is key!

Geographic reference: United States
Year: 2010 and a forecast for 2014
Market size: $1.5 and $4.6 Billion respectively
Source: “Market Size Projections for mHealth and Wireless Health”, Wireless Health Strategies, March 19, 2010, available online here.
Original source: CSMG, a division of TMBG Global
Posted on September 06, 2011

Posted in Health Care, Hospital Equipment, Information Technology, Medical Devices, Mobile Devices. No Comments »

The Public Cloud

June 23, 2011 — The Editors

Cloud computing is, in the simplest terms, the use of a remote location, accessible through the Internet, to store the data and applications used on a computer. We discuss this market in more detail in a post from May 3rd. Today’s market size is the size of the public cloud which is defined by the source as a service that is commercially offered to an “unrestricted marketplace of potential users.”

Geographic reference: World
Year: 2010 and forecast for 2015
Market size: $21.5 and $72.9 billion respectively
Source: Larry Dignan, “IDC: Public cloud market will hit $72.9 billion in 2015,” ZDNet, June 20, 2011, available online here.
Original source: IDC

Posted in Computing, Information Technology, Mobile Devices. No Comments »

Cloud Computing

May 3, 2011 — The Editors

A term we hear quite often these days is cloud computing. The personal computer revolution was, in part, a step
away from what were then the large, centralized mainframe computers on which data was stored and accessed through workstations. With a personal computer one had everything on his or her own device. Now, in a way, there is a decoupling again of the data from the device. Cloud computing is, in the simplest terms, the use of a remote location, accessible through the Internet, to store the data and applications used on a computer—instead of a harddrive on the local computer or local network of computers.

This is a growing business but one whose boundaries are still being defined, which makes it difficult to measure. It is hard to keep the image of a person trying to measure a cloud coming to mind. Consequently, one can find many different size estimates for cloud computing, the differences usually having to do with how the market is defined. What we present here is an estimate of the revenue from business cloud services—hardware and software infrastructure as well as the leasing of space—so it does not include, for example, the services provided to people wishing to back-up their family photo albums. Cloud computing services to the individual is another large business and one that may be included in other estimates of the nebulous cloud computing market.

Geographic reference: World
Year: 2010 and forecast for 2014
Market size: $22.2 Billion and $55.5 Billion respectively
Source: Lohr, Steve, “The Business Market Plays Cloud Computing Catch-Up,” The New York Times, April 15, page B16
Original Source: IDC

Posted in Computing, Information Technology, Mobile Devices. No Comments »

App Store Sales

March 23, 2011 — The Editors

We hear a lot about “apps” these days, or application programs. But what are they, really. These are computer programs designed as standalone software to run on a variety of devices, usually mobile devices. These apps are sold through online stores and usually have a well defined and somewhat limited purpose. They usually have a filename extension “.app” for use on mobile operating systems such as Android; iOS (Apple); Linus; MeeGo; Microsoft Mobile; RIM (BlackBerry); and Symbian.

Apps are a class of products whose market is based on volume. The average price of an app is around $2.50, (reached with lots sold for 99¢ and a few sold for $9.00 plus) so a whole lot of apps had to sell in order to reach the market size presented below. There are 5 billion mobile device subscribers worldwide, according the the International Telecommunications Union (ITU). Now, all mobile devices are not “smart” devices and thus are not equipped to run apps. Nonetheless, based on the fact that an estimated 10% of these 5 billion devices are smart we can calculate, very generally, that each one of these smart device owners bought just under two apps in 2010. There seems room for growth here…

As a side note, that figure of 5 billion mobile device subscribers is rather noteworthy given that the world population in 2010 was just shy of 7 billion. Food for thought.

Geographic reference: World
Year: 2010
Market size: $2.15 Billion
Source: Whitney, Lance, “Report: Apple Remains King of App Store Market,” CNET News, February 15, 2011, available online here. Also, press release from the ITU which is available online here.
Original Source: IHS Screen Digest, February 2011

Posted in E-Commerce, Entertainment, Information Technology, Mobile Devices, Telecommunications. 2 Comments »

Mobile Phones Worldwide

January 7, 2011 — The Editors

The market size listed here is the number of mobile phones sold worldwide in the third quarter of 2010, of which, 19.3% were smartphones, as we saw in our last market size entry.

Geographic reference: World
Year: 3rd Quarter 2010
Market size: 417 Million Units
Source: “Gartner Says Worldwide Mobile Phone Sales Grew 35 Percent in Third Quarter 2010; Smartphone Sales Increased 96 Percent,” Gartner Newsroom press release dated November 10, 2010 and available online here.
Original Source: Gartner Inc.

Posted in Market Size, Mobile Devices, Telecommunications. No Comments »

Smartphones

January 6, 2011 — The Editors

The definition of a smartphone, according to PC Magazine, is as follows: “A cellular telephone with built-in applications and Internet access. Smartphones provide digital voice service as well as text messaging, e-mail, Web browsing, still and video cameras, MP3 player and video and TV viewing.” In addition to their built-in functions smartphones can run a variety of computer applications which makes them true computing devices. All of this functionality varies from smartphone to smartphone and to a large degree depends on the operating systems that run these devices. The leading smartphone operating systems, based on units currently in use, are (1) Apple’s iPhone OS, (2) RIM Blackberry OS, and (3) Google’s Android OS.

The market size listed here shows the number of smartphones sold worldwide in the third quarter of 2010. Smartphone sales in this quarter represented 19.3% of all mobile phone sales.

Geographic reference: World
Year: 3rd Quarter 2010
Market size: 80.5 Million Units
Source: “Gartner Says Worldwide Mobile Phone Sales Grew 35 Percent in Third Quarter 2010; Smartphone Sales Increased 96 Percent,” Gartner Newsroom press release dated November 10, 2010 and available online here.
Original Source: Gartner Inc.

Posted in Mobile Devices, Telecommunications. No Comments »
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