How Has Technology Developed Over The Past Ten Years?

Technology developed over the past years. Predicting the future is relaxed. We do it all the time. The only delicate part is getting it right. So, as it’s that time of year again that we release our annual Top 10 Consumer Trends report, our 10th Anniversary Report, we’re taking a look back at a decade of consumer technology trends.

How Has Technology Developed Over The Past Ten Years?

In late 2011, Ericsson Consumer Lab released the first Top 10 Consumer Trends report. And I remember quickly putting it together on the plane on my way to a client appointment. Since then, I’ve been the lead author of all our trend reports, but this one was undoubtedly written in a different, more innocent time. However, with the trend “social media is redefining journalism”, he was already pointing to a world ruled by tweets. And it wasn’t just gossip columns, and the report made it crystal clear that social media is redefining severe reporting.

The construction of 4G LTE networks was a large part of our considerations and the mobile communications technologies based on them. Moreover, the smartphone app industry, especially the social media industry, was already booming.

we correctly predicted the rapid expansion of the smartphone app landscape and biometric security features such as fingerprint recognition

Video Caption: In 2013, we correctly predicted the rapidly expanding landscape of smartphone apps and biometric security features like fingerprint recognition.

Take Twitter, for example. In 2007, Twitter users sent around 20,000 tweets a day. By 2010, the amount had risen to about 50 million tweets per day.

Flanked by 2014 and 2018, the average time spent on social media apps increased by nearly 60%, as we originate in our Social Media Consumer Report.

From Darkroom To Light Filter: ConsumerLab has been the voice of consumers since 1995

Caption: From dark rooms to light filters, ConsumerLab has been the voice of the consumer since 1995

Technology Evolution Through The Years

In late 2012 we released our second report, which more or less precisely repeated a trend from the earlier year that hadn’t ensued since. But, again, women drove the smartphone market, making internet use today predominantly mass market and no longer a question of “technology”.

In late 2014, we took a big step into the future with the release of our 2015 Hot 10 Consumer Trends and Minded Sharing Trend report. Which predicts that in 2020 a wearable device will be available to share thoughts directly with others to communicate. Could be! Or maybe too soon, as in 2020,

Neuralink demonstrated a pig with a brain implant, and OpenBCI announced a brain recognition device that seamlessly connects to VR glasses.

But the media headlines came with the 2016 report and trend “AI is killing the age of the screen”. Ericsson says smartphones will be dead in 5 years, the press shouted in an almost global meme. We wanted to highlight the early signs of a paradigm shift. Where our everyday internet device is finally resting on our heads instead of our palms. So we follow that