Mobile app explosion in Asia Pacific region demands more application-aware networks

ENGLAND: The explosion of smartphone and mobile application usage is having a dramatic impact on network infrastructure requirements, as more users access networks via apps than the mobile web. This is particularly true in the Asia Pacific region.

In fact, Portio Research recently forecast that global mobile app users will jump from 1.2 billion in 2012 to 4.4 billion in 2017 with much of the growth coming from Asia, which will account for close to half of the mobile app users in 2017.

This growing mobile app usage when combined with a lack of application awareness in networks is causing significant challenges for network infrastructure vendors, including intelligence providers, reporting and subscriber analytics systems, policy and charging solution, firewall vendors, and network security providers.

“Given the constantly changing traffic profile of mobile users due to explosive app usage, all network infrastructure vendors today must incorporate application awareness that is capable of classifying, monitoring, measuring and monetizing network traffic if those providers are to remain relevant,” said Hendrik Schulze, CEO and co-founder of ipoque.