GEC NEWS WIREThe Middle East and Africa augmented and virtual reality market will grow strongly over the next five years, posting annual growth rates of more than 100% across the 2016–2020 period, according to the recently launched ‘Worldwide Augmented and Virtual Reality Spending Guide’ from International Data Corporation. The global ICT and advisory services firm expects the MEA market to expand from a relatively moderate value of $181.59 million this year to top a staggering $6 billion in 2020.
Saad El Khadem, Research Analyst at IDC, META. “However, the global success of Pokémon Go has brought the concept to a much broader audience. And with industry powerhouses such as Microsoft, Samsung, Google, Sony, and Facebook pushing the technology to the masses, end-user awareness and familiarity is only going to grow. We forecast spending on AR/VR hardware elements to grow from $118 million in 2016 to reach more than $3.2 billion in 2020.”
IDC expects consumers to account for more than $100 million of the region’s AR/VR spending in 2016. This represents a share of around 56%, and makes the consumer segment the biggest in the region as things stand.
However, IDC expects the consumer segment’s share of the market to steadily fall over the forecast period as the commercial segment sees more and more use cases emerge for the technology. From a global perspective, Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan), the United States, and Western Europe will account for three quarters of worldwide AR/VR revenues in 2016, according to IDC.
