Global consumers are expected to spend $6.2 billion at mobile application stores in 2010, while related advertising revenue will generate $0.6 billion worldwide, according to Gartner, Inc.

Mobile app stores will exceed 4.5 billion downloads in 2010, 8 out of 10 of which will be free to end users, Gartner analysts said.

Worldwide downloads in mobile application stores will surpass 21.6 billion by 2013 and will generate more than $29 billion in revenue.

“As smartphones grow in popularity and application stores become the focus for several players in the value chain, more consumers will experiment with application downloads,” said Stephanie Baghdassarian, research director at Gartner. “Games remain the #1 application, and mobile shopping, social networking, utilities and productivity tools continue to grow and attract increasing amounts of money.”

Free Apps Dominate

Free downloads will account for 82% of all downloads in 2010, and will account for 87% of downloads by 2013. Free applications have value because the developer charges for other things within the application. There are also applications that are free to use but that charge for physical goods delivered through the application. Others derive their revenue from advertising. This is done with banners as well as full-page advertising such as that between game levels in game apps.

from here

Mobile navigation for everyone

Ovi Maps takes you where you want to be and shows you what you want see, with navigable maps for over 70 countries worldwide. All this with only one click. And it’s all free.

• Free Drive navigation
• Free Walk navigation
• Free maps and map updates
• Free Events guides
• Free Lonely Planet guides
• Free Michelin guides

Compatible devices: Nokia X6, Nokia N97 mini, E72, E55, E52, Nokia 6730 classic, Nokia 6710 Navigator, Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic, Nokia 5800 Navigation Edition, Nokia 5230.

More details can be found on Nokia’s website

You can download the file from the Deloitte’s site (and also find a summary in Romanian) and you see the most important points (which I’ve considered important, of course) on my site Stiri din Telecom (even if in Romania, the summary is in English).

For those interested in telecom industry, you have to read at least the summary, if not the whole document, because it contains useful information and interesting trends.

It is unlikely that the telecommunications sector, not to suffered from the global economic climate. But while global growth could be cyclical, the need for telecommunications is and will remain fundamental