Where Future Smartphone Growth Is Going to Come From

Despite the recent slowdown in the higher end of the smartphone market, there is a lot of growth potential left in the industry. According to Ericsson's latest Mobility Report, the number of global smartphone subscriptions will grow from 1.9 billion in 2013 to 5.6 billion by 2019.

Most of that growth won't happen in established markets such as North America and Europe though, where smartphone penetration is already very high. Ericsson predicts the number of smartphone subscriptions in the Asia-Pacific region to grow from 988 million in 2013 to more than 3 billion in 2019. A lot of that growth will happen in the lower end of the market, which is why many experts think that Apple needs a significantly cheaper iPhone to participate in future growth.