Thanks in part to booming business in Latin America, Syniverse said this week it has reached an internal milestone in managing mobile messaging traffic: 1.6 billion per day.
That average over the second quarter of this year was up 23 percent over last year, a testament to both the increase in mobile data usage and the 20 new contracts the company has signed in Latin America.
The new levels showed a greater frequency of texts, Tweets, picture and video sharing, financial transactions and e-commerce. Peer-to-peer messaging volumes, which include both short messaging service (SMS) and multimedia message service (MMS), also were up 23 percent, but quarter-over-quarter. MMS traffic grew by 202 percent over last year and SMS traffic showed 22 percent year-over-year growth.
Tony Holcombe, president and CEO of Syniverse, said it helps drive usage that SMS is now enabled on nearly 100 percent of the world’s handsets. There are more than 500 million messaging-enabled mobile devices are currently active in Latin America alone. “Alll types of mobile providers as well as new entrants to mobile are motivated to take advantage of its broad reach,” he said. “In fact, we have added more than 15 new SMS customers across the globe in the second quarter alone.”
Portio Research’s “Mobile Messaging Futures 2010-2014” report said SMS traffic in this part of the world will grow from 250.2 billion messages in 2009 to 403.7 billion in 2014, while MMS traffic is expected to grow from 1.8 billion to 5.7 billion over the same period.
One of Syniverse’s 20 new mobile messaging contracts is with Open Mobile, which chose Syniverse to power both its in-country and international SMS messaging, providing the SMS interoperability its subscribers demand for texting.
“Syniverse’s network and roaming solutions have served as the enabler of Open Mobile’s services for years,” said Frank Bell, president and COO, Open Mobile. “When we decided to strengthen our mobile messaging capabilities, we knew that Syniverse was the right partner to engage because of its continued track record of superior customer service, reliability and flexibility.”
Earlier this year, CTIA-The Wireless Association chose Syniverse to support the launch of the Latin America Common Short Code initiative. Short codes are six-digit numbers used to address SMS messages and can be used by consumers to obtain information, contribute to a charitable cause, purchase content, view promotions and more.
Holcombe said the CSC initiative is not the only new messaging application driving Syniverse’ increased revenues or customer diversification in Latin America – or globally. The company continues to see strong growth in its mobile enterprise messaging (MES) business with volumes up 72 percent compared to the second quarter 2009.
