Human mobility patterns might change post Covid, Ericsson surveys suggest, with possible ramifications for connectivity provider revenue and investments.
About 25 percent of survey respondents say they will switch to public transport, biking or walking. But 33 percent say they will increase car travel, and use public transit less.
Of more importance to some are possible changes in air travel, as up to 33 percent of consumers believe they will reduce air travel.
Also, consumers will have added 10 hours per week of online time, and 2.5 more services to their daily online activities as they recreate habits after the Covid pandemic. So there will be more application usage and therefore more data access demand.
The issue is where those activities will occur. Commuters on public transport will tend to use more mobile data, drivers much less. But if permanent work at home behavior happens, there will be less demand for mobile data overall, as most of those at-home workers might connect to Wi-Fi instead of the mobile network.
Also, dramatically less air travel will mean lower roaming revenues.
Capital investment to improve coverage or capacity could also be reshaped a bit. Fewer people traveling to downtown urban cores means any investments in capacity or coverage will last longer before upgrades are required.
What happens in suburban or “exurban” areas is more complicated. One might assume greater needs for capacity and coverage investments, but much depends on user willingness to connect to Wi-Fi first. If so, then capex requirements will be lessened a bit.
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