Ericsson forecasts the future of mobile (pictures)

New internal forecasts recently shared by Ericsson examine the state of mobile, market trends, and where we can expect the industry to be in five years.

Here, we see a snapshot of the current playing field for share of mobile data traffic by application type, largely dominated by video.

Ericsson shows the projected share of mobile data traffic by application type in 2018, which sees video taking a huge jump in the coming years, dominating nearly half of the mobile data consumed.

This chart shows a daily comparison of voice and data traffic in London, New York, and Hong Kong from December 10, 2012 through January 8, 2013.

An hourly comparison of voice, data, and SMS activity for the greater London area.

Average minutes per month spent using the network from a smartphone shows heavy social-networking and instant-messaging usage.

Average monthly traffic volumes in mobile PCs versus smartphones.

Application mobile data traffic volumes broken down by mobile PCs, tablets, and smartphones.

Device penetration for local mobile broadband subscribers.

Device penetration for data roaming subscribers.

Projected mobile data traffic by application type from 2010 through 2018.

Projected smartphone and mobile PC traffic per month from 2013 through 2018.

Projected global fixed traffic from 2010 through 2018.

This chart shows Ericsson's projected mobile subscriptions by connection technology type from 2009 through 2018.

Ericsson's projected fixed and mobile subscription projections, in millions, from 2009 through 2018.