Bigger Than The Entire Economy?
New numbers from Gartner and IDC this week show the global IT market at $3.7 trillion, or about 5% of the world economy. How many people understand how big this number is?
New numbers from Gartner and IDC this week show the global IT market at $3.7 trillion, or about 5% of the world economy. How many people understand how big this number is?
Let’s put that number in context with a few others that are familiar to all of us:
* The US Federal budget is $2.9 trillion in 2009.
* The entire US economy is $14.2 trillion in 2007, according to the BEA data here. Or around $15-17 trillion in 2008/2009 depending on what you believe (the BEA has not yet released updated stats).
* The Federal Government debt is now $11.3 trillion ($5.8T held by public) and was projected to be $10.6T in 2008 before the bailout.
I’m going to try to do a little better. Here are a few things I did with numbers as part of my research on the tech market:
• Created a model that categorized various product and service categories as technology or not.
• Wrote an article called “A Penny Saved is NOT a Penny Earned!” In it I explored the relationship between savings and income, concluding that savings has little to do with income, and that those who save are in fact the most successful.
• Conducted a survey of over 6,000 people about their use of technology. This was part of my series “How American Use Technology: A Look at How American Use Technology and What It Means for Business”
I also wrote a lot about the Internet of Things (IoT), including:
• The Internet of Things Has More Potential Than You Think (Forrester)
• Internet of Things: The Next Big Thing? (Huffington Post)
• Internet of Things: What’s Next in Smart Homes and Cities (Forbes)
In addition to the strong mix of gadgets, we’ve seen a continued rise in the number of shoppers who are purchasing smart home devices. Based on our research, we believe this is due to increased awareness of the technology and broader availability of smart home products at more affordable price points.
For some additional context, our data shows that 70% of the top 100 best-selling items on Amazon during the first six months of 2017 were gadgets. But new gadgets are constantly entering the market, so it’s important to keep an eye on emerging trends.
We’ve identified three areas where there is likely to be significant growth in 2018: fitness trackers, smart displays, and smart speakers with a screen.
Every single year there’s a new set of gadgets and gizmos emerging, and every year technology becomes more mainstream.
The PC has been the most successful consumer device ever sold, but the smartphone is catching up to it quickly. The time spent on mobile apps are now surpassing that of the web.
Smartphones have been around for almost 10 years now, with sales starting in 2007. It took 4 years for smartphones to reach the 100 million mark in sales, while it took just 2 years to hit 1 billion (2011).
Smartphones have been around for almost 10 years now, with sales starting in 2007. It took 4 years for smartphones to reach the 100 million mark in sales, while it took just 2 years to hit 1 billion (2011). Smartphones are on a tear and sales are expected to reach 2 billion units per year by 2018.
Tablets are relatively new and have been around since 2010. Sales hit 100 million units in 2013 and are expected to reach 300 million units per year by 2017.
PCs have been the mainstay of computers since 1981 when IBM began selling its first PC models to consumers. PCs were already being used in businesses for several years prior to this date. The first desktop PCs were built by hobbyists in their
Tech trends can be captured in several ways. The first is unit sales, the second is by price, and the third is by revenue. Unit sales are easy to determine but don’t offer much insight into what’s going on. As an example, if you compare the iPhone to the iPad by units sold over time, it would appear that iPads are a fad and the iPhone has staying power.
This graph clearly shows the iPad as a fad. But when we look at prices (and revenue), we get a very different picture.
The iPad had a big launch in 2010, but then sales collapsed in 2011. If it were not for the iPad mini and its lower price point Apple could have been in real trouble with this product category.
The iPhone has been more consistent and stable over time, but it has also been trending down in price since its launch. It would be interesting to see how many iPhones Apple would sell if they priced it at $400-500 again like they used to.
Finally, here are both products plotted against each other by revenue (not price) so you can see how close they are in terms of dollars generated for Apple.
So should you consider an iPad or an iPhone? There really isn’t that much difference between them
How many of these have you owned?*
* Cell phone
* Desktop computer
* Digital camera
* Ebook reader
* External hard drive
* Fitness tracker
* Flash drive/thumb drive
* Game console (Xbox, PlayStation, Wii)
* GPS device (Garmin, TomTom) or app (Google Maps, Waze)
* Home security system (ADT, Brinks) or app (Nest, Dropcam)
* Home theater system or streaming device (Roku, Chromecast)
* Laptop/netbook computer
* Media streaming service (Netflix, Spotify, Pandora)
* MP3 player (iPod, Sansa) or app (iTunes, Groove Music)
* Nest thermostat or other connected home gadget (Amazon Echo)
* Printer or all-in-one scanner/copier/fax machine/printer device (Canon Pixma)
* Router for wireless internet access at home or office
* Satellite radio service (SiriusXM Radio)
* Smart TV or set top box like Apple TV
* Smart watch or smart jewelry like Fitbit
* Tablet computer like iPad
* Universal remote control
This weekend I was in San Francisco and I bought a pair of socks. The brand of the socks is called Stance, they have a lot of star power behind them?—?they have endorsements from Dennis Rodman, Steph Curry, and even George Costanza. They have extensive product lines and a pretty good price point. And they are bringing their own approach to an old product.
What caught my interest in this purchase was the fact that the socks were sold to me at retail at the very same time I found them on clearance online for 50% off. At first, I thought it was just an odd coincidence but when I did some digging around I realized it wasn’t; there are a few key reasons why Stance is having trouble selling through its clothing inventory.
The first is that it’s a new brand without any real market presence. It’s not like Nike where you can find articles about Nike written every day in magazines and newspapers. As far as I can tell, there are no endorsements outside of the celebrities already mentioned. For a brand that wants to be seen as innovative it needs to get more press coverage and make sure its name is getting out there more often.
The next problem with Stance is that it’s not really clear what type of