Russia’s M2M service market grew a hefty 63% year-to-year by June 2012, from an estimated 1.84 to 3 million SIM card enabled connections, MTS, a leading Russian mobile operator and retailer, has found in a special study.
Sharing its results with Russian news agency RIA Novosti, Valeria Kuzmenko, a spokesperson for MTS, said the company, alongside all other Russian mobile operators, tends to consider the segment “promising,” as the domestic voice telecommunications market is nearing saturation.
Wireless networks are currently tapped for data transmission by makers of vehicle-mounted navigators, sensors, surveillance cameras, cash machines, and an array of other devices.
According to its research MTS concludes that transport monitoring accounts for 40% of the Russian M2M market. Remote medicine, e-government services and vending machine-enabled sale of goods and services are the fastest-growing M2M applications.
MTS estimates that it has a 48% share of Russia’s M2M segment and adds approximately 80% of all new M2M-enabled devices to its client base each year.
In an exchange with RIA, Vimpelcom, another Russian mobile operator, opted not to comment on the MTS findings as there seems to be no general understanding as yet regarding the criteria used to single out M2M connections. However, a company executive said said the operator is shooting for a doubling of its M2M connections in 2012.
