"As a testament of SMS's rapidly declining popularity in developed countries, Hong Kong's Office of the Communications Authority (OFCA) reported a drastic decrease in the number of messages sent and received on January 1 2013," a report by Business Monitor International, a UK based consultancy said."This, coupled with WhatsApp's claim that it processed 18bn messages on December 31 2012, highlights the need for mobile operators to devise new strategies to counter the threat of over-the-top (OTT) service providers."Hong Kong has reported that 10.9 million SMS messages were sent on January 01, 2013 plunging 58.9 percent from a year earlier and 19.8 million received, down 44.4 percent from a year earlier.
"Overall SMS traffic in Hong Kong peaked around late 2011, but has since been rapidly falling," BMI said.
"The rapid shift in consumer habit is attributable to the growing adoption of smartphones and mobile data services, which provides an affordable alternative to SMS," the BMI report said.
"Mobile data usage has surged in the last two years, directly coinciding with SMS's decline.
WhatsApp, as well as Asian based competitors like LINE and KakaoTalk allow instant messages and pictures to be sent to other clients who have a user ID, the same was skype allow international calling using a data link.
Devices using Apple's iOS, Google's Android, Nokia's Symbian, Research In Motion's BlackBerry and Microsoft's Windows Phone can run the software.
"Overall SMS traffic in Hong Kong peaked around late 2011, but has since been rapidly falling," BMI said.
"The rapid shift in consumer habit is attributable to the growing adoption of smartphones and mobile data services, which provides an affordable alternative to SMS," the BMI report said.
"Mobile data usage has surged in the last two years, directly coinciding with SMS's decline.
WhatsApp, as well as Asian based competitors like LINE and KakaoTalk allow instant messages and pictures to be sent to other clients who have a user ID, the same was skype allow international calling using a data link.
Devices using Apple's iOS, Google's Android, Nokia's Symbian, Research In Motion's BlackBerry and Microsoft's Windows Phone can run the software.
In December 2012, WhatsApp had processed 7 billion inbound messages and 11 billion outbound messages worldwide on December 31. In August 2012 WhatsApp had said it processed 10 billion messages, up 1,000 percent from a year earlier.
"We do not see the growth momentum of WhatsApp and similar services such as ChatOn, KakaoTalk and LINE tapering any time soon given that smartphone ownership is still on the rise, particularly in emerging markets as more low-cost devices are being launched," BMI said.
"While SMS over IP services could help to shift customers away from basic voice and SMS plans to more expensive mobile data subscriptions, meaning mobile operators should see a boost to their revenues, relying purely on mobile data subscription revenue is a poor means of monetisation for operators in the long term."
"This is especially when operators have to heavily invest in their networks to cope with the data traffic."
