Mobile Data Traffic Expected to Surge

There is a coming tsunami of mobile devices, from tablets to smartphones, that will guzzle data and consume scarce bandwidth. But how much more data will these devices consume?

"When we look at overall mobile forecast, we're seeing some dramatic growth that is taking place," said Doug Webster, senior director of market management for Cisco Systems' service provider group. Webster said the company expects the volume of mobile data traffic to increase 39 times over the next 5 years, largely due to the fact that there will 5 billion devices, from e-readers to tablets and smartphones, connected to mobile networks over that timespan. "We're going from less than a tenth of an exabyte to more than 3.6 exabytes per month," he said. The findings are part of a Cisco report released Tuesday that forecasts mobile data growth between 2009 and 2014.