The fanfare entrance into the market of smartphones is hardly breaking news, but eyebrow-raising figures show how Germany is next up for the app-fed mobile data revolution.
After a 7.8 percent fall in mobile phone sales overall in 2011, smartphones have been almost single-handedly responsible for a surging revival that has seen an 8.6 percent increase in sales in 2012 and promises a 9.3 percent increase in 2013.
Dealing with this changing media will be a key issue at the forthcoming Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, where Germany Trade and Invest will be informing visitors on Germany's changing market.
"There will be nearly 30 million smartphones in circulation in Germany by the end of this year," said Julia Oentrich , Manager of Information and Communication Technologies at Germany Trade and Invest.
"This is close to the number having doubled within three years."
According to the Federal Association for Information Technology, Telecommunications and New Media (BITKOM), 81 percent of the phones in circulation in Germany will be smartphones by the end of 2013, with 96 percent of the revenue coming from smartphone usage.
But while phones are on the increase, talking time isn't. Chatting to friends is an increasingly smaller part of the revenue from mobile phones, falling by 7 and 4 percent in 2011 and 2012 respectively. Usage of phones for data services balances this out. There will, says BITKOM, be a 9.4 billion Euro turnover in mobile data services in 2013.
"Where Germany is set to leave its mark is in the data services," continued Oentrich.
"Apps like the Berlin-born EyeEM, which recently overhauled Instagram as most popular photo-sharing app, illustrate how active German companies are becoming in the industry."
Germany Trade & Invest is the foreign trade and inward investment promotion agency of the Federal Republic of Germany. The organization advises foreign companies looking to expand their business activities in the German market. It provides information on foreign trade to German companies that seek to enter foreign markets.
