The U.S. wireless data market continued to ignore the recession doldrums in the fourth quarter of 2008, growing 7.3 percent over the previous quarter and 38.7 percent over fourth quarter 2007 to reach $9.4 billion in mobile data services revenues. In 2008, mobile data services revenues reached our original estimate of $34 billion. Even as the global industry crossed 4 billion in subscriptions and $1 trillion in total revenues, the nervousness due to the current recession has been palpable.
While the flailing economy has started to hit hard on the wireless data ecosystem — especially the infrastructure and handsets segments — consumers haven’t really pulled back on overall mobile data spending, just yet. There are, however, sub-segments of the mobile data revenue stream that are starting to feel the pinch, such as data card subscriptions and downloadable apps. In the event of a longer recession, the fate of the U.S. mobile industry will be more closely tied to the overall economy than in previous recessions.