Mobility is reshaping consumer gadget spending and behavior, says Gartner

Household adoption and spending on consumer technology products is shifting faster than expected in favor of gadgets and services that are portable or mobile and those that deliver networking capabilities and entertainment, according to a recent survey by Gartner. The major change is that mobility is now reshaping mainstream consumer behavior in fundamental ways, the way people organize their lives and the spaces they live in.

The Gartner survey was conducted during July and August of 2012 and included responses from more than 8,000 consumers in the US, the UK, Canada and the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China).

"Early adopters tend to leave the home notebook in the bag and are abandoning the home office in favor of the lounge room couch or bedroom to do online activities in a more comfortable environment using a tablet or smartphone," said Nick Ingelbrecht, research director at Gartner. "This early adopter trend is becoming mainstream consumer behavior. Consequently, technology and service providers are faced with no alternative but to innovate for mobility. If they do nothing, they face a potential train wreck as consumers abandon gadgets, services and applications that do not fully support changing mobile lifestyles."

The average household spending by users of media tablets, e-book readers, notebooks and digital cameras has fallen even as household penetration of these devices has increased. Falling prices and increased technology performance are primary drivers of increasing adoption and multiple purchases.

According to the survey, legacy products such as TVs and desktops have the highest mean years between upgrades, at four-and-a-half years and four years, respectively, while newer product classes such as tablets and e-book readers have yet to be replaced by the majority of respondents. Replacement and upgrades of fixed devices such as desktops and game consoles will be deferred or abandoned as consumers find they can do most of what they want on more recently purchased portable devices anywhere they want when they want. The things they cannot do will either get postponed to a later time or be forgotten about altogether as consumers reorganize tasks and activities to the devices and services they prefer to use.

"Where they are occurring, the lengthening of gadget replacement cycles reflects a mixture of economic pressures on the consumer wallet and hardware product maturity," said Amanda Sabia, principal research analyst at Gartner. "Increasingly, upgrades are taking place in software, content and application ecosystems supported by cloud services, relieving the requirement for hardware upgrades."

Sabia said that PC and game console vendors can address attrition of desktop replacements by focusing product road maps and consumer branding initiatives on upgrade paths to portable devices or, alternatively, on home media hubs that provide storage and remote retrieval to the personal cloud.

The shift to wireless access and portable devices represents both a threat and an opportunity to technology vendors. Some static device ownership paradigms such as desktops and television sets remain stable while others, such as TV-related boxes and home networking equipment, increase. Consumers' shift to more mobile devices and applications provides opportunities for equipment to deliver Internet access and content as well as to accelerate the development of mobile solutions and portable extensions to traditionally fixed products and services.

Gartner: Household penetration and average annual spending by device owners, 2010 and 2012 (US$)
	2012 penetration	2010 Penetration	2012 average spend	2010 average spend
Mobile phone	94%	NA	289	173
Notebook	55%	40%	726	821
Tablet	17%	3%	503	624
Desktop	60%	60%	642	754
Netbook	14%	7%	462	493
E-book reader	14%	5%	185	233
Television set	96%	96%	685	593
STB (DVR, video recorder, digital decoder/cable box)	45%	25%	98	107
Digital camera/Camcorder	65%	36%	292	364
Personal media player or mobile Internet device player	37%	33%	165	139
Handheld video game device	18%	16%	225	200
Video game console	25%	23%	258	324
Printer for Mac or PC	44%	42%	144	157
Home networking equipment	47%	32%	121	81

Source: Gartner, compiled by Digitimes, March 2013