Mobile telephony undergoes a complete generational change each year because of the sheer number of people coming into the market, most of them being first time users. In other words, the field this year, by way of customers, will be more radically different when compared to the previous year, than what we can imagine for any product.

How then do we target the buyers, because by the time we get to know who they are, an entire new generation of buyers are upon us? At some 450 million, the numbers are so large that the physical location of the customer itself could show radical shifts in terms of proportion contribution from different places within a circle.

As for profile, the change would be enormous. It does not mean that any particular section ceases to exist. It is just that the contribution of different segments, changes.

This generational change impacts all aspects of marketing and operations, including physical reach of signals, distribution, targeting, both by way of the vehicles and the messages, the product offerings, etc.

It is in this context that our report for potential for mobile telephony offers an excellent reference point.

There have been four similar efforts in 2001, 2003, 2005 and 2007.

The study estimates all individuals who already have a mobile phone and the number of others in the population who are “like” those who have adopted it so far, identified through Discriminant analysis.

The study also includes a momentum forecast, which projects individual segments and the projections of probabilities of adoption of individuals, going by the data in 2001, 2003, 2005, 2007 and 2009 together with the growth in the universe of relevance, taking into account the growth in purchasing power.