News: Press Releases

New Frost & Sullivan Paper Points to Next Explosive Growth Area for Mobile Operators and Service Providers

Consumer mobile email projected to grow 24% annually over next four years, exceeding SMS and MMS and fueled by open source

Redwood City, Calif., July 19, 2007 — Funambol, the mobile open source software company, and Frost & Sullivan, a global growth consulting firm, today announced the availability of an important new white paper detailing the opportunity for mobile operators and service providers to turn mobile email for consumers into significant new revenue. The free white paper, “Open Source Push Email & PIM for the Consumer Market,” is immediately available and can be requested at http://www.funambol.com/solutions/requestpublication.php.

“The F&S findings confirm that now is the time for mobile operators and service providers to tap into the vast revenue potential of mobile email on everyday cell phones,” said Fabrizio Capobianco, Funambol CEO. “Consumer mobile email deployments increase subscriber retention while countering flat SMS revenues and consumer turn due to number portability and price competition.”

The report's findings include:

Mobile messaging growth over the next 18 months will shift with the transition of mobile email in the enterprise to mobile email on mass market consumer phones.
Mobile operators and service providers have a ripe opportunity to turn mobile email for consumers into their next big cash cow, which will become increasingly important as revenue from SMS plateaus and consumers become less loyal.
Global mobile email usage is expected to grow 24 percent annually over the next four years, with explosive growth projected post-2008 due to rapid consumer email adoption. This compares to 1 percent growth for SMS and MMS during this period.
An open source standards-based consumer push email solution is not just a benefit to developers. It provides mobile operators and service providers with broad device compatibility, low cost, ease of use and the flexibility required to tap into the mass market.

“Mobile email will become much more popular with all wireless subscribers,” said J. Gerry Purdy, Ph.D., co-author of the report. “Consumer email will join enterprise email as standard on mobile devices in the coming years. Mobile email that leverages open source and standards has the best chance for rapid adoption.”

The white paper's contents include:

Consumer Mobile Messaging Overview
Mass Market Mobile Email Opportunity
Why Providers Should Care about Mobile Email for Consumers
Open Source and Open Standards in the Mobile Email Environment
What's Next? You've Got "Unified Messaging" and Mobile 2.0
Recommendation for Promoting Consumer Mobile Email

About Frost & Sullivan

Frost & Sullivan, a global growth consulting company, has been partnering with clients to support the development of innovative strategies for more than 40 years. The company's industry expertise integrates growth consulting, growth partnership services, and corporate management training to identify and develop opportunities. Frost & Sullivan serves an extensive clientele that includes Global 1000 companies, emerging companies, and the investment community by providing comprehensive industry coverage that reflects a unique global perspective, and combines ongoing analysis of markets, technologies, econometrics, and demographics. For more information, visit http://www.frost.com.

About Funambol

Funambol is the mobile open source company and is the leading provider of open source push email and PIM sync for consumers. Funambol is supported by a global community representing more than 1,000,000 downloads and 10,000 contributors in more than 200 countries. The commercial version of Funambol’s software has been deployed at wireless operators, Fortune 100 enterprises, hardware OEMs/ODMs and ISVs including customers such as Earthlink and Computer Associates. Funambol is headquartered in Redwood City, California, with a development center in Italy. See www.funambol.com.

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