Mobile trends for the year 2014

1. Mobile Trends 2014
Industry briefing
From mega-mergers to
wearable tech, data privacy to
an overdue boost in battery
performance, here are ten
trends set to shape the
wireless industry in 2014.
Compiled by
WDS, A Xerox Company.
Technology
Services
Consulting

2. WDS Mobile Trends 2014
Mobile Trends 2014
At the beginning of each year we put our reputation on the line to identify 10 key
trends we expect to shape the mobile industry over the coming 12 months.
Contents
Sure, we don’t get everything right…but last year our view of Android’s broader role in the consumer electronics
industry, the continued relevance of feature phones and a slow-down in patent litigation have all rung-true to
a certain extent.
To kick off 2014 we’ve compiled a fresh set of predictions. Some will be familiar; others may take you by
surprise. Of course we welcome your comments. Let us know if you agree or disagree with this year’s list.
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wdspodcast
5
Smartphone manufacturers flex their muscles
7
iOS and Android hit the road
9
Chinese smartphones come of age
11
Sportswear manufacturers lead the charge in wearable tech
13
Your call is important to us
15
This is the fifth year we’ve run our annual trends and so far our predictions seem to have been on-target.
Respect my privacy
17
Mega-mergers
19
Camera resolutions reignite the spec war
21
Batteries finally get a boost
23
Social sentiment improves decision making
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3. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Smartphone manufacturers flex their muscles
Mobile
Trends
“Flexible”
1
The form factor of today’s smartphone has
stagnated, which makes the potential for flexible
materials all the more exciting.
It’s still early days and while we saw some interesting
announcements in 2013, we don’t expect to see
flagship devices sporting flexible displays this year.
However, 2014 will be the year of experimentation
with OEMs exploring curved devices, wrap-around
screens, different shaped devices and devices that
can flex.
Some will be little more than a gimmick or designconcept, but by the end of the year we should
have a better idea of the true benefits delivered by
flexible components, and be ready for more serious
contenders in 2015.
Expect Asian brands to lead the charge on this
technology with devices from LG and Samsung
showing early innovation.

4. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
iOS and Android hit the road
Mobile
Trends
“Vrroom”
2
Hyundai, Kia, Tesla and Mini have already
announced the integration of smartphone OS
platforms in their upcoming launches and we
expect this trend to spread like wild fire across the
automotive industry.
Today, automotive brands implement different
proprietary OS platforms to power their in-car
computers and multimedia systems. As such, they
have a closed system that users can’t modify.
By implementing smartphone OS platforms,
automotive brands can expand the possibilities of
interaction between the driver and the car.
The two big contenders are iOS and Android, with
both announcing automotive partnerships and
development projects.
Obvious (and immediate) benefits will focus
on smarter multimedia applications for in-car
entertainment, with music and video integrated
closely with passenger devices, cloud storage
accounts and content libraries. Also, look out for
location and mapping applications as well as social
check-ins.
By next year, as the volume of connected cars
increases, we’ll see the arrival of an entirely new
app ecosystem; supporting the needs of the driver
through entertainment, telemetry, navigation and
more.

5. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Chinese smartphones come of age
Mobile
Trends
“China”
3
Chinese brands are hitting the market hard with
impressive devices at very competitive price
points.
Historically, Chinese manufacturers have posed the
greatest threat at the low-end of the smartphone
market but this year we can expect to see increased
competition at the high-end. However, despite highquality implementations and the latest specs, price
will remain the primary weapon.
As such, by the end of the year we expect that three
of the top five smartphone manufacturers (by
shipment volume) will be Chinese.
In 2013 Samsung and Apple held their lead and we
expect they will continue to do so in 2014. However,
3rd, 4th and 5th positions remain unsteady and by
the end of 2014 we predict Huawei, Lenovo and ZTE
will secure all three spots.

6. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Sportswear manufacturers lead the charge in wearable tech
Mobile
Trends
“Wearables”
4
Wearable tech was the buzzword of 2013, but this
year we expect tech brands to step it up a gear
and launch wearables designed to be worthy of a
more discerning wish list.
Like flexible displays, 2014 is perhaps a little too
early for us to confidently predict a mass-market
explosion of wearable tech. However, it will remain a
key focus for many companies, attracting start-ups,
investment and exploration by a wider ecosystem of
brands.
Of course, we’ll see continued innovation around
high-profile products such as the Samsung Gear
and Google Glass. However 2014 will see more
innovative applications of biometric technology
embedded within sportswear, with companies such
as Nike, Apple and Fitbit leading the charge.
More interesting will be how established clothing
brands partner with technology brands. Will luxury
brands embrace or reject the idea of wearable tech?

7. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Your call is important to us
Mobile
Trends
“Smart”
5
Automated customer care and technical support
will become more intelligent as several key
technologies converge around the support
industry.
Being able to automate customer care and technical
support has long held many promises for brands
looking to reduce their support costs; and for
customers wanting an efficient means of resolving a
problem. However the reality has never quite lived up
to the promise. Rambling IVR systems, overwhelming
online knowledge bases and less-than-intelligent
online support “avatars” have frustrated customers
for years. However 2014 is the beginning of the
end for these technologies as automated customer
support gets turned on its head.
Due to the cost of running traditional support
environments (staffed by thousands of people) the
support business is one of those industries that
attracts a surprising amount of R&D investment.
Today, a number of complementary technologies
are beginning to mature and converge around the
industry. Voice recognition, sentiment analysis,
machine learning and natural language processing
have all come of age to deliver more accurate,
automated support solutions that could shave
millions of dollars off a brand’s annual support bill.
We’re talking about automated support interfaces
able to understand the context of a question,
identify sentiment and interpret a natural
conversation while self-learning and factoring-in
customer preferences (time of day, location, etc), to
ensure a right-first-time solution.

8. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Respect my privacy
Mobile
Trends
“Privacy”
6
Technology brands are at the center of a privacy
debate, caught between government protocol and
their customers’ best interests.
Privacy was a big issue in 2013. In particular, people
began to understand just how much of their data
was open to being monitored by government
agencies around the world. Consumer sensitivity
has since increased and it’s the tech brands that are
hurting the most.
“People won’t use technology they don’t trust,”
said Brad Smith, Microsoft’s general counsel, in a
statement to the US Congress. “Governments have
put this trust at risk, and governments need to help
restore it.”
Brands including Apple, Yahoo, Facebook, Twitter,
AOL and LinkedIn have joined Google and Microsoft
in mounting a public campaign to limit government
surveillance and protect their customers.
We expect 2014 to bring greater transparency on
the collection and usage of data as well as new
functionality within well-known services that place
privacy controls front-and-center, handing power
back to the consumer.

9. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Mega-mergers
Mobile
Trends
“Fusion”
7
Mobile operators around the world will further
consolidate in a bid to combat slow growth,
increasing costs and shareholder demands.
In 2013 we saw mass consolidation of the US market;
AT&T bought Leap Wireless, T-Mobile bought
MetroPCS, Softbank bought Sprint and Sprint
bought out its remaining stake in Clearwire.
In Europe, the year started with regulatory approval
of a merger between Hutchinson and Orange in
Austria by the European Commission; creating a
highly concentrated Austrian mobile market. We
also saw Telefonica buy E-Plus in Germany.
Many have seen these deals as the start of
something bigger; a more relaxed regulatory
framework that has traditionally protected
competition by maintaining consumer choice.
While the US is likely to settle down in 2014, we
predict a hotbed of activity in Europe with at least
one non-European buyer looking to make its mark
on the continent.
Further afield, keep an eye on Africa where
consolidation will be a viable (although difficult)
means of improving returns for struggling mobile
operators. Also, Australia’s large number of MVNOs
is creating real pressure for consolidation.

10. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Camera resolutions reignite the spec war
Mobile
Trends
“Smile”
8
In the early days of the smartphone, camera
resolutions were at the center of the spec-war.
It was a key differentiator in a sea of identi-kit
devices.
By 2012 things had begun to settle down and
resolutions normalized between 8-12 megapixels.
Then, in 2013, Nokia bought us a feat of engineering
genius with a 41 megapixels camera phone (the
Nokia Lumia 1020); and the race was back on.
We have already seen Sony deliver a 20.7 megapixel
camera in its flagship Xperia Z1 and the likes
of Samsung and Apple are expected to deliver
significant improvements on their current camera
specs, each sporting cameras in the region of 20
megapixels. However, for 2014 at least, we expect
that smartphone cameras with 30+ megapixels will
reside within a niche segment of the market, rather
than in key flagship devices.
As smartphone cameras move beyond the pointand-shoot market and into something a little
more serious, we should also expect improvements
to camera software with greater control over
exposure, shutter speed, ISO, white balance and
focus. Likewise expect optical image stabilization
technology to trickle down into mid-range devices.

11. Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Batteries finally get a boost
Mobile
Trends
“Oomph”
9
When it comes to innovation, the humble battery
has been neglected. However, we predict 2014
to be the year we receive the news we’ve all been
waiting for.
Over the last year, we’ve seen significant
advancements in the development of silicon supercapacitors that promise full re-charge in minutes
with battery life that lasts for weeks.
Battery technology has been falling behind in recent
years. The stock answer has simply been to increase
the battery capacity, granting the user another hour
of usage (at best).
It’s a long-shot, but this year we expect the
technology to be further developed for commercial
use and the launch of a super-capacitor powered
smartphone to be announced by the end of the year.
We can all but hope.
Poor battery performance is one of the unfortunate
compromises we all have to make as we demand
faster, bigger and higher resolution devices.
However, scientists the world over are racing to
extend the boundaries of lithium battery technology.

12. “Social”
Mobile
Trends
WDS | Mobile Trends 2014
Social sentiment improves decision making
Mobile
Trends
Using social media for customer engagement is
so 2013.
10
The huge volume of social traffic passing through
platforms such as Twitter has been largely untapped
as a source of customer insight.
“Social”
While brands have matured in their use of
social tools to communicate with, and
even support, customers, most have
been unable to cut through petabytes
of noise to understand customer
sentiment in a way that can improve
internal decision making.
However, the technology matured quickly in the
last half of 2013 and we expect more and more
brands to start building “social sentiment” into
their product development lifecycles and business
planning processes; keeping track of product /
service performance, monitoring customers’ feature
requests, analyzing buying habits and even acting as
an early warning system for potential support issues.

13. www.wds.co
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