The worldwide recession has caused hard times for many businesses, however it has had little effect on their use of mobile data services. According to an update to ABI Research's Business Mobility Market Data, global mobile data services revenue are expected to increase by 17 percent in 2010, and through 2014, mobile data services revenues will grow at a Compound Annual Growth rate of 12 percent.

Revenues from mobile broadband are expected to be at their highest from 2010 to 2014 in North America, but the largest share of mobile broadband services revenue will go to mobile business customers in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, where 2014 revenues will increase to 27 and 26 percent of total spending respectively.

The Asia Pacific area, application download revenues will see its greatest growth amongst mobile business customers The highest portion of average revenue per user spent for these applications will come from business customers in Western Europe and Asia Pacific.

ABI practice director Dan Shey said:

"Company consolidations have forced the remaining workforce to become even more efficient. Mobile data services offer the most options for tailoring services to the needs and work practices of workers in order to increase productivity and business efficiency."

Messaging services will maintain their top position for data revenues, which will be fueled by the penetration and growing use of SMS services by business customers worldwide. Total revenues worldwide for messaging from this segment will grow 10 percent through 2014, which equals about $48 billion.