A recent report finds that “mobile services should hit $870 billion in 2014 as mobile broadband, messaging expand.”

That’s from Infonetics (News - Alert) Research, which has updated its “Mobile Services and Subscribers: Voice, SMS/MMS, and Broadband” report based on revenue reported for the first half of 2010 (1H10), resulting in increased short- and long-term revenue forecasts.

 "The overall wireless industry performed above expectations during a period of economic stress -- albeit unevenly across various world regions -- and will continue to grow as macroeconomic conditions improve,” said Stephane Teral, Infonetics Research's (News - Alert) principal analyst for mobile and FMC infrastructure.

 Teral noted that only the western European telecom services market was “significantly affected” by the economic crisis, and “still struggles to recover as Greece, Ireland, Italy, Spain, and Portugal continue to suffer.” He said that means mobile broadband and mobile messaging service revenues are “growing rapidly and will help operators offset declining voice revenues, but voice service isn’t going away anytime soon; in fact, voice will still account for almost 60 percent of the mobile pie in 2014.”

 The report discloses that operators need to continue selling smarter phones and upselling data plans to keep pace with falling voice usage as well: In 1H10, global mobile service revenue grew 6.5 percent over 1H09, driven mainly by Latin America, Asia Pacific, and North America:

 “Mobile broadband service revenue is forecast to grow the fastest of the three primary mobile services, with a 25 percent 5-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2009 to 2014

Infonetics expects the number of mobile broadband subscribers to grow to 1.8 billion worldwide in 2014 (28 percent of all mobile subscribers), after surpassing fixed broadband subscribers for the first time in 2010, driven by massive adoption of smartphones.”

 Earlier this month TMC (News - Alert) had the news that Infonetics released its fourth quarter 2010 (4Q10) Service Provider VoIP Equipment and Subscribers market share and forecast report.