It has been nearly 10 years since the launch of the iPhone, and demand for smartphones is inevitably slowing down. According to a recent Accenture report, purchases have been falling over the last two years, with just 48 percent of consumers intending to buy a smartphone this year, down six percentage points from 2015. The change is being fuelled by a saturated market that is seeing a shift in the way consumers buy their phones. Increasing choice is giving customers the ability to buy cheap smartphones online and approach operators for the service side only. At the high-end of the market, consumers are holding on to devices for longer, and this is in turn causing a slow in the upgrade cycle. As a direct result, there has been a move away from operator subsidies. Most operators are already transforming their businesses to fit the latest buying trends, seeing them bundling content deals with 4G contracts, for example.
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