What you need to know
What with 95% of adults already being cellular service subscribers, there is little to no opportunity to increase the number of subscriber lines, outside of nominal additions related to overall population growth. Simultaneously, the amount consumers have typically paid per month for service has shown little increase in the 21st century in total, and when inflation is taken into consideration, monthly spend has actually fallen. These findings stand even though carriers are spending $30 billion annually on capital expenditures to improve the quality and speed of networks.
In an effort to leverage that infrastructure, carriers are transitioning the costs of mobile video consumption off the backs of consumers and onto the expense sheets of video distributors and advertisers. The brilliance of this choice lies in the incentivization it creates for mobile entertainment aficionados to base their carrier selection on network speeds, rather than price points.
Inside of the framework of these rapid shifts, Mintel analyzes the industry from the perspective of industry expertise in assessing the competitive advantages and disadvantages between carriers, as well as from the perspective of the subscriber, with both quantitative and qualitative research that explores carrier selection, carrier satisfaction, interest in changing carriers, and attitudes to mobile data services.
This report builds on analysis presented in Mintel’s Mobile Service Providers – US, March 2015; Mobile Service Providers – US, February 2014; and Mobile Phone Service – US, February 2013 reports.
