MUMBAI: Consumption of data has begun to gain tract and the number of mobile video calling users are forecasted to touch 160 million by 2017, according to the ‘Mobile & Tablet Voice & Video Calling - Strategic Opportunities & Business Models 2012-2017’ report by Juniper Research.

The report states that the advertising and freemium models are starting to emerge in the mobile video calling market but revenue generation remains the key challenge for mobile video calling players. The increase will be driven by improvements in both user-interface and underlying technology.

Freemium models are being explored but are behind other areas of the broader mobile market, while mobile advertisers have yet to explore the potential of mobile video calling in earnest. Over the next five years, revenues from the circuit switched voice market are expected to continue to fall.

Juniper Research analyst and author of the report Anthony Cox said, “Mobile advertising per se is becoming main-stream but the model still needs to be adapted for mobile video calling for meaningful revenues to become available to service providers.”

According to the report, specialist mobile VoIP firms are opening their application programming interfaces to third parties including MNOs to gain revenues. The arrival of 4G will give further impetus to mobile VoIP take-up but potentially accelerate the decline in overall voice revenues for MNOs.

Advanced IP-based services will develop faster in developed markets due to the direct correlation between 3G and 4G rollouts and the take-up of mobile VoIP and mobile video calling.