The joy of text
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Now businesses get the texting bug.
Text messaging has been one of the slow-burning successes of the mobile phone industry. When the digital mobile networks first introduced it a decade ago, few subscribers knew what to make of the service. Messages were incredibly fiddly to write and could only be sent to subscribers on the same network.
A technology the networks initially predicted would appeal to business users was largely driven by the youth market. But it is slowly catching on with enterprises too: around 14% of text messages are now sent for commercial purposes, and this proportion is growing.
The most recent figures available from the Mobile Data Association (MDA) put the monthly total of text messages at a staggering 2.2 billion in January 2004 this year, more than one-quarter more than last year.
Despite the attraction of alternatives, such as multimedia messaging and mobile email, the MDA expects the text tally to continue to grow.
The MDA does not calculate cash figures for the business, but estimates that texts account for 20% of operators' revenues. With a text costing, on average, between seven and 10 pence, an annual UK market worth between £1.4 billion and £2 billion cannot be far off the mark.
