Trusted by more than 23,000 companies
Spending on artificial intelligence (AI) varied greatly across industries in 2023, with the banking and retail industries delivering the largest AI investments in 2023. Worldwide spending on AI-centric systems was estimated at 154 billion U.S. dollars in 2023 across all industries. The banking sector's investments amounted to 20.6 billion U.S. dollars, the highest across the observed industries. It was followed by retail, with an investment value of 19.7 billion U.S. dollars. The financial sector's investments into AI are forecast to grow significantly between 2024 and 2027.
ByteDance’s triumphant TikTok/ Douyin is one of the most successful Chinese brands that have made its name beyond borders. The short video brand enjoyed immense popularity around the world, surpassing Instagram and WhatsApp to be the most downloaded mobile app. In 2023, the brand value of TikTok/Douyin amounted to 84 billion U.S. dollars. It was the most valuable unicorn worldwide in 2023 with a market cap of 200 billion U.S. dollars.
TikTok versus Douyin: the major differences
After Douyin’s success in China, ByteDance launched TikTok - a separate, international version of Douyin- in 2017. The video-sharing platforms, though quite similar in interface and functions, are two independent entities. Douyin and TikTok differ in accessibility (mainland China versus rest of the world), content results (China-based content versus international content), positioning (skills and lifestyle-tips-based versus more art-based), and functions (Douyin has more advanced live streaming and in-app purchase features).
Who is using TikTok and Douyin?
The duo possessed a large user base. In 2024, TikTok was estimated to have over 900 million users while that of Douyin would exceed 795 million in China. American and Southeast Asian countries were TikTok’s major markets. On average, the international version had a relatively older user composition than its Chinese sister app – a third of users aged below 34 years registered on TikTok versus two-thirds on Douyin. In some countries like the United States, TikTok has achieved a high penetration rate among young adults.
How many apps are there in the Play Store?
The number of available apps in the Google Play Store was most recently placed at 2.43 million apps, after surpassing 1 million apps in July 2013.
Google Play Store
Google Play was originally launched in October 2008 under the name Android Market. As Google’s official app store, it offers its customers a wide range of applications and digital media including music, magazines, books, film, and TV. As of April 2021, the ranking of the top-grossing Android apps worldwide is dominated by mobile games with Coin Master, Garena Free Fire, and PUBG mobile leading the ranking. This hardly comes as a surprise as it is estimated that gaming apps will account for over 70 percent of Google Play app revenues in 2024. As most apps in the Google Play Store are available for free, the company needs to utilize effective business models to secure healthy revenue.
How do apps make money?
Despite the robust gaming app revenues, most gaming apps are free to download and rely on monetization via in-app advertising or in-game purchases of items such as boosters and accessories. A November 2021 survey of mobile app publishers found that video ads were the most popular mobile app monetization model, followed by display ads and in-app purchases. Additionally, monetizing via subscriptions has proven an effective model for several highly popular apps, with subscription revenues hitting 18.3 billion U.S. dollars in revenues in 2021.
In December 2023, 12 percent of survey respondents said that the most important problem facing the United States was the high cost of living and inflation. Another 16 percent said that the government and poor leadership was the most serious problem for the nation.
Most downloads of Shein's mobile app occur on iOS devices. In December 2023, the fashion app registered roughly 1.5 million downloads from iPhones and iPads, while Android devices accounted for about 1.2 million downloads that month. Shein's online store is among the fastest growing fashion retailer websites in the United States.
According to preliminary data published by the National Bureau of Statistics of China in January 2024, the growth of real gross domestic product (GDP) in China amounted to 5.2 percent in 2023. For 2024, the IMF expects a GDP growth rate of around 4.2 percent.
Real GDP growth
The current gross domestic product is an important indicator of the economic strength of a country. It refers to the total market value of all goods and services that are produced within a country per year. When analyzing year-on-year changes, the current GDP is adjusted for inflation, thus making it constant. Real GDP growth is regarded as a key indicator for economic growth as it incorporates constant GDP figures. As of 2022, China was among the leading countries with the largest gross domestic product worldwide, second only to the United States which had a GDP volume of almost 25.5 trillion U.S. dollars. The Chinese GDP has shown remarkable growth over the past years. Upon closer examination of the distribution of GDP across economic sectors, a gradual shift from an economy heavily based on industrial production towards an economy focused on services becomes visible, with the service industry outpacing the manufacturing sector in terms of GDP contribution.
Key indicator balance of trade
Another important indicator for economic assessment is the balance of trade, which measures the relationship between imports and exports of a nation. As an economy heavily reliant on manufacturing and industrial production, China has reached a trade surplus over the last decade, with a total trade balance of around 878 billion U.S. dollars in 2022.
In 2023, the best-selling album in South Korea was "FML" by SEVENTEEN, with around 5.5 million units sold. This breaks BTS' six year streak as the group is on hiatus. Labelmates SEVENTEEN twice broke BTS' record for pre-sales as well as general album sales in 2023, having also achieved the third best-selling album that year. General album sales, as well as sales of K-pop albums specifically, have seen rapid growth since 2017.
As of December 2023, the inflation rate in the European Union was 3.4 percent, with prices rising fastest in Czechia, which had an inflation rate of 7.6 percent. By contrast, both Denmark and Belgium saw low inflation rates during the same period, with Belgium having the lowest inflation rate in the EU during this month at 0.5 percent. The rate of inflation in the EU in the October 2022 was higher than at any other time, with the peak prior to 2021 recorded in July 2008 when prices were growing by 4.4 percent year-on-year. Before the recent rises in inflation, price rises in the EU had been kept at relatively low levels, with the inflation rate remaining below three percent between January 2012 and August 2021.
The reopening of the European economy in 2021 following the sudden shock of COVID-19 in 2020 is behind many of the factors that have caused prices to rise so quickly in recent months. Global supply chains have not yet recovered from production issues, travel restrictions, and workforce problems brought about by the pandemic. Rising energy costs have only served to exacerbate supply problems, particularly with regard to the transport sector, which had the highest inflation rate of any sector in the EU in December 2021.
The high inflation rates seen in Europe have been reflected in other parts of the world. In the United States, for example, the consumer price index reached a 40-year-high of seven percent in December 2021, influenced by many of the same factors driving European inflation. Nevertheless, it is hoped that once these supply chain issues ease, inflation levels will start to fall throughout the course of 2022.
In the winter of 2023, the contribution of wind energy to the electricity production in Germany skyrocketed, whereas the contribution of solar power declined precipitously. December saw a wind power share in Germany's electricity mix of over 40 percent, while coal contributed 25 percent to the electricity generation of the country.
Germany phased-out nuclear energy in April 2023.
The national news brand with the highest reported drop circulation in the United Kingdom was Sunday People, with a circulation decrease of 19 percent. The leading national paper by circulation, the Daily Mail, saw a drop of 10 percent.
Online newspaper readership
The newspaper industry is having to make major readjustments to accommodate digital readership. Physical paper sales have been falling as consumers increasingly turn to online news outlets. Data on the monthly reach of national newspapers revealed that smartphones are the most popular platform for newspaper consumption across all major news brands, though free paper Metro had the highest print reach thanks to its regular distribution across London.
Journalists
Despite the fall in newspaper circulation, the number of journalists in the UK is climbing. In 2020, over 100 thousand journalists and newspaper and periodical editors were employed in the United Kingdom, the highest number recorded since 2010.
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