Application to person (A2P) SMS is the terminology used for application to subscriber or subscriber to application short messaging service. The service finds essential applications in different forms of notifications, alerts, promotional messages, polling contests, news, flight alerts, banking updates, and many more. Due to its wide ranged applications it finds applications in almost every industry segments such as financial services, banking, tourism, retail, healthcare, and entertainment.

Mobile subscriber consumer base of over 5 billion across globe will provide substantial growth potential to A2P SMS market

According to GSM Association (GSMA), the global telecom operators have over 5 billion mobile subscribers, encompassing over two third of the global population. SMS is the most conventional and cost-effective means for communication that can be conveniently utilized as a form of media and promotional purposes. Moreover, increasing reliance of consumer on smartphones for various activities that include social networking, shopping and usage of mobile wallets on daily basis is expected to provide high impetus to the overall A2P SMS market over the forecast period.

A2P SMS Market Taxonomy

On the basis of applications, the global A2P SMS market is classified into:

Customer relationship management services

Pushed Content Services

Interactive Services

Promotional campaigns

Others (Query and search based services)

On the basis of end users, the global A2P SMS market is classified into:

Retail

BFSI

Transportation and transit

Utilities

Education & Healthcare

Others (Media, Gaming and entertainment)

Banking, Financial services and Insurance (BFSI) dominated the end use industry segments owing to various identification, alerts and phone banking related applications

Typical applications of these services in BFSI segment include authentication of users of online services, banking notifications, critical transaction alerts (due payment, balance statements, minimum balance requirements, etc.), SMS banking and promotional campaigns for new BFSI policies. These applications are projected to increase at considerable rates and positively influence growth of the BFSI segment in the A2P SMS market through the forecast period. Moreover, proliferating e-commerce retail industry is expected to provide strong growth prospects. Retail specific applications include location based promotional campaigns, contests, coupons, product discount & sale announcements and enhanced consumer service. Owing to these applications, customer relationship management accounted for the largest A2P SMS market share among application segments.

Character limitation and limited audience engagement will continue to act as potential growth barrier to the industry growth

Advertising space of the service users is limited to 160 characters and the target audience cannot be efficiently attracted with the use of additional audio or animation content. Moreover, advertisers find it difficult to engage consumer for text services and end up getting spammed. Owing to proliferation of many other messenger apps, such as WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, QQ Mobile, among others, consumer tendency to rely on text messages has considerably decreased. These factors are projected to limit the end user inclination towards these services, which in turn would hinder the overall A2P SMS market growth.

Asia Pacific to be the key growth engine of the A2P SMS market

According to United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and Pacific (UN ESCAP), Asia Pacific is home to largest consumer base across the globe, accounting for over 60% of the global population. Emerging economies such as China, India, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia are expected to provide significant growth prospects over the forecast period, owing to the large mobile subscription base in these regions. Moreover, proliferation of smart banking and e-commerce in the regions will provide significant demand surge for A2P SMS market.

Major industry participants include FortyTwo Telecom AB, AMD Telecom S.A., Syniverse Technologies, LLC, Silverstreet BV, Ogangi Corporation, mBlox, Inc., Symsoft AB, Tanla Solutions Ltd., OpenMarket Inc., Optimizer International Group, Inc., and Angkor Data Communications Group Co. Ltd. Industry. Industry competitors are projected to invest in best firewalls, appointing best aggregators, and expansion of their regional expanse to strengthen their industry foothold. For instance, in May 2017, CLX announced the acquisition of Dialogue Group, for over US$ 40 million, to strengthen its positioning in Asia Pacific region.