A new research report from Berg Insight estimates that 108 million mobile network connections were being used for machine-to-machine (M2M) communication at the end of 2011, a 37% increase on the previous year. Asia-Pacific was the strongest regional market, with a year-on-year growth rate of 64%, while Europe saw annual growth of around 27% to 32.3 million connections.

The total global number of wireless M2M connections is now forecast to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 27.2% to reach 359.3 million in 2016.

Tobias Ryberg, Senior Analyst at Berg Insight, said “2011 was the year when M2M communication really took off in China. The number of wireless M2M subscribers in the country nearly doubled and is now estimated to exceed 20 million. We believe that China Mobile became the world’s largest M2M connectivity provider at the end of 2011 with around 14 million subscribers. If the trend continues, the Chinese market will surpass the US in absolute terms within two to three years”.

ABI Research published similar figures earlier this year, predicting a total of 365 million M2M connections worldwide by 2016.

[Report brochure (pdf)]