(4 October 2008 3:00 pm)

MUMBAI: A global study released by Accenture shows that tech-savvy consumers would prefer a single-networking solution to link all their portable, home and automobile digital devices, which presents a major challenge — and opportunity — for communications carriers.

The study Telecommunications Competitive Future Research: A Consumer Perspective examined the opinions of 600 global consumers who are heavy users of digital devices and services. The study reveals that an overwhelming majority (87 per cent) of those surveyed believe that most personal digital devices will be networked, with more than four in five (81 per cent) of all respondents preferring a single point of control for all of them.

Moreover, more than half (53 per cent) of respondents said that a single-vendor approach is the best way to provide a centralised control function. 85 per cent of respondents said that customer support was the most important criterion when selecting a company to manage multiple devices and services.

These tech-savvy consumers also place high levels of importance on security and privacy standards (selected by 80 per cent of respondents) and the ability to support standards across vendors (78 per cent).

Accenture’s communications industry practice MD Andrew Zimmerman says, “Our research found that consumers who juggle multiple devices and data services have already identified the need for a central control function to simplify the management of their personal technologies.

“Given that some industry projections indicate there will be one trillion digital devices attached to networks within the next 15 to 20 years, a service that makes everything work together is both necessary and inevitable.

“But there is no clear frontrunner in the race to provide this service. However, unified customer support — a major strength of communications providers — was overwhelmingly chosen as the most important factor when selecting a single company to manage multiple devices.”

Zimmerman adds, “Several years ago, Accenture recognized that ‘user experience’ in a networked world comes down to the skilled orchestration of devices, data and controls — or ‘trivergence,’ as we call this phenomenon. This compelling new research confirms that trivergence is an important technology trend that is already apparent to tech-savvy consumers. The vast majority understand the concept, expect it to flourish, and believe that it will improve their lives.”

Among the survey’s other key findings:

* Life Simplification: The greatest areas of interest for leveraging single-networked capabilities identified were at the personal technology level. Consumers believe the concept could simplify their lives by enabling home monitoring and management (selected by 66 per cent of respondents), automobile maintenance and management (59 per cent) and media management (59 per cent) on the network.

* Hard Demand for Soft Panel. When given alternate choices for managing connected devices, the greatest proportion of consumers (49 per cent) said they prefer managing all devices from a single website or “soft panel,” compared with 32 per cent who prefer each device having an associated widget and 19 percent who prefer a separate website for each device.

* Who Consumers Trust to Bring Control. A majority of consumers (58 per cent) said they would trust technology companies – the designers and manufacturers of their digital devices – as a single-vendor provider of the control function. Communications carriers were ranked second as trusted providers, selected by 48 per cent of respondents.

* Business Impact in Developing World. While tech-forward consumers in the emerging economies of Brazil, China and India have the same, if not greater, appetite for networked services as consumers in developed countries, they were much more likely to view these services as empowering them economically. Specifically, more than 90 per cent of study participants in Brazil and China said they believe that trivergence will create new business opportunities and help them in their careers.

* Personal Data for a Price. 83 per cent of tech-savvy consumers believe they should share in the proceeds if a company sells their personal information for advertising purposes. Moreover, two-thirds (66 per cent) of all respondents said they would be inclined to “opt-in” to a program that sells their personal data to marketers if they — the consumer — share in the proceeds and their full identity is not revealed. Almost half (48 per cent) said they were inclined to “opt-in” even if their full identity were disclosed as long as they shared in the proceeds.

* Privacy Protections. Although the tech-forward consumers in the study appear eager to trade limited personal data for a share of the benefits, that access comes with specific conditions. The vast majority of respondents (87 per cent) said they believe that companies should be required to obtain their permission before they use personal data for advertising purposes, and an even greater number (91 per cent) said that they believe that companies should be required to state exactly how they will use consumers’ personal information.