UK Gaming Habits Examined
One in five U.K. Internet users, exceeding 2.4 million in quantity, visited a games site during December, although only 194,000 actually played, according to the latest figures from NetValue. In comparison, 4.8 million Americans played online, while Spanish users spend the longest amount of time on games sites. The report added that 28 percent of all users in the U.S. visited a games site in the same period, or 23,814,000 unique visitors. More than 4.8 million actually played games over the Internet, evidence that the online gaming market in America is more mature, and where fast Internet access is more widespread. In Europe, the U.K. leads Germany, France, Spain and Denmark in terms of both visitors to games sites, as well as the number of individuals playing games online. Just under a fifth of users in Spain visited a games site. Meanwhile Spanish users remain online the longest. They stayed online an average of 27 minutes, with Danish and U.K. users just behind at 23 minutes. French and German users remained online for just 14 minutes. American users remained longest, staying for an average of 37.9 minutes.
Online Gaming Set to Change
The online gaming industry is changing, IDC says. Thanks to improved Internet capabilities, next-generation video game consoles, and nontraditional gaming platforms an estimated 40 million households will be lured into online gaming by 2004, up from 25 million in 2000. To keep pace with the industry's
growth, companies with a vested stake in online gaming will need to develop their business models. "To succeed in this competitive space, companies must formulate a profitable revenue model, extend the reach of online games beyond the PC and ensure that gamers remain loyal," an IDC analyst said.
This mean, IDC researchers say, that building a diversified revenue base is one of the biggest challenges facing online gaming companies. "Because advertising revenue, which most business models are currently built upon, could dry up in the future, many sites are looking to create more attractive advertisement opportunities beyond banner ads through sponsorship and targeted ads and are trying to migrate free subscribers to paid subscribers," the IDC analyst added.
Other activities, such as licensing technology and co-branding games, could also open up revenue opportunities.
A Little Lottery Information
Ernst & Young Forensic Services BV, in a report commissioned by the Netherlands Gaming Control Board and the Dutch Gambling Platform, found that illegal gambling non-Internet related exceeded 0.5 NLG annually, reported the Lottery Insider. As part of the study Ernst & Young studied illegal casinos, commercial bingo, illegal betting on horses, illegal lotto, toto and lottery games.
Consumers Will Pay for TV-Based E-Commerce Services
In "TV-Based E-Commerce: An Investigation of Consumer Interest, Pricing and Payment Preferences," a new study from TechTrends, Inc., researchers have put together a detailed report intended to guide companies in their decisions regarding features and pricing for t-commerce applications. The study explores factors that consumers consider when making t-commerce transactions, such as cost, convenience, security and ease of use. Additional analysis reveals consumers' preferred payment methods for TV-based transactions, including automatic billing to a cable/satellite statement, typing credit card information and smart card or credit card-swiping. One in six of all cable and satellite subscribers, for example, are willing to pay a monthly fee for t-commerce applications. Other findings included in the report:
- The majority of consumers prefer to have t-commerce transactions billed to their monthly cable or satellite statements, while only one in six consumers prefer to type their credit card information on-screen.
- More than half of non-online shoppers consider a transaction's "security" to be the most important consideration.
- Although one in three consumers show an interest in TV-based banking and investing, only one in 17 would pay more than $3 per month for this type of service.
- Consumers who access the Internet on their PC while watching TV (simultaneous users) have very different levels of interest and price sensitivity for most t-commerce applications than consumers who engage in both activities separately (non-simultaneous users).
- Nearly one-fourth of simultaneous users would pay a monthly fee to order restaurant meals for immediately delivery, compared to about one-sixth of non-simultaneous users.
$33 Billion Network Edge Switching/Routing Market Ahead
A recent report by leading telecom market research firm RHK Inc. indicates that the North American network edge switching and routing market reached $7.6 billion in 2000, and is expected grow at a CAGR of 44 percent to $33 billion by 2004, writes Newstream.
The report, "Edge Switching & Routing: Market Forecast and Analysis," shows that IP-centric network edge equipment will account for almost 60 percent of equipment vendor revenues by 2004 vs. some 37 percent in 2000. This growth is expected to come at the expense of current ATM and Frame Relay network edge offerings as global networks move to a greater degree of IP-centricity.
One segment of the IP edge device sector that RHK expects to achieve significant growth is the market for service creation devices, which enable service providers to offer IP-based value-added network services. This sub-market alone is expected to grow at a projected CAGR of over 90 percent during the 2000-2004 forecast period.
"We believe service creation devices offer service providers the ability to improve their bottom-lines through the creation of valued-added, differentiated services -- thus making this segment a potentially explosive omponent of the edge market," observed Bob Larribeau, Director of Edge Switching & Routing at RHK. "As a result, we expect IP-based systems to be increasingly pervasive as providers better exploit services that expand the revenue-generating abilities of IP networks." The report shows that while
the market for multiservice products, including ATM and Frame Relay switches, is expected to grow at a CAGR of 29 percent from $4.7 billion in 2000 to $13 billion in 2004, this growth rate has been, and will continue to be, impacted by the increasing dominance of IP in service provider networks.
"ATM is far from dead," added RHK's Edge Switching & Routing Analyst, Rosalyn Roseboro. "Many service providers are building out their IP networks, and realistically still depend on some ATM and Frame Relay access technologies to support their existing customer base. While the world is migrating to IP, our numbers indicate that multiservice products will remain a significant but lower growth market. ATM continues to have quality of service advantages over IP, so we expect to see some carriers opt for a
degree of ATM depth in their networks for the near to intermediate term."
Definitions: RHK defines the IP edge equipment market as devices that reside at the edge of the service provider network, taking traffic to/from the access segment and feeding it to/from the network core. These devices include aggregation routers, session management devices, and service creation devices.