Growth expected in global services revenue for 2021

Worldwide spend on telecommunications and pay TV services is forecast to reach US$1.5 trillion in 2021.

According to the International Data Corporation (IDC), this would represent a 1% increase over 2020, with positive movement attributed to the quick recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.

APAC is expected to experience the fastest growth, due to higher-than-expected growth in the Chinese mobile segment in H1 2021. IDC also forecasts positive growth in EMEA, while the Americas will experience slow but stable increases.

The report goes on to predict that major trends will not change over the next five years. Value of fixed voice and mobile voice services segments will be gradually declining, while the value of fixed data and mobile data services portions will be slowly growing. Also unchanging will be the slow decline of pay TV services as consumers continue to migrate to OTT.

Overall, the research firm estimates that global services revenue will reach US$1.545 trillion for 2021. 

Kresimir Alic, research director, Telecommunications at IDC, said: “The troubles related to COVID-19 are still not in the rear-view mirror as the worsening pandemic dynamics in some low-income countries and the global supply-chain disruptions threaten to harm the fragile recovery of the market. But because of the resiliency the industry showed during 2020, we are convinced that the market will remain in a positive mood for at least the next couple of years.”