Taiwan market: Over 90% of Internet surfers have used mobile data services, but adoption still limited

Of Internet users in Taiwan, 90.7% have at some time used mobile data services on a handset or smartphone, according to an international Worldwide Mobile Data Service Survey (WMDSS). However, SMS messaging was by far the most prevalent service used while adoption of other data services is still limited in the Taiwan market.

The survey included 1,143 participants and was conducted by the Foreseeing Innovative New Digiservices (FIND) research group under the government-sponsored Institute for Information Industry (III) in August 2008.

Communication, consisting of SMS, e-mail, MMS and video phone, was the category used most commonly, especially SMS, FIND pointed out.

Participants sent on average 13.76 SMS messages per week in the month prior to the survey, FIND indicated. For data services other than SMS, the average usage time per week was only 30.57 minutes, equivalent to 4.37 minutes per day, FIND noted.