Property & casualty (P&C) insurance companies are failing to meet their customers’ expectations when it comes to digital interactions, according to the J.D. Power 2018 Insurance Digital Experience Study.

Worldwide shipments of devices -- PCs, tablets and mobile phones -- are on pace to record 0.9 percent growth to reach 2.28 billion units in 2018, according to Gartner, Inc. The PC and tablet market is estimated to decline 1.2 percent in 2018, while the mobile phone market is on pace to record an increase of 1.4 percent.

One-tenth of all U.S. broadband customers are watching the new esports content form, while 62 percent spend at least one hour per week playing video games, according to new research from Parks Associates. Additionally, 62 percent of U.S. broadband households play video games at least one hour per week.

Nearly 10 percent of industrial smart glasses and standalone virtual reality (VR) devices will have a 5G connection by 2026, according to a new forecast from ABI Research. Additionally, augmented reality (AR) is growing in presence in industrial applications such as smart manufacturing and remote operation of industrial machinery.

More than half (51 percent) of consumers who are active in buying or renting video content consumed at least some digital content, which is 7 percentage points higher than last year, according to a new report from NPD Group.

The rise of smart cities will accelerate the adoption and growth opportunities of demand response (DR) solutions in the residential segment, according to new research from Frost & Sullivan.

The Australian Enterprise and Service Provider (SP) Ethernet Switch Market grew by 12.4 percent year-over-year (YoY) in the first quarter of 2018, according to IDC's APAC Quarterly Ethernet Switch Tracker. The market, which includes data centers, ended up generating revenues of $122.4 million.

As businesses become increasingly concerned about the impact cybersecurity can have on business outcomes, security leaders should harness that increased support to improve their organization’s resilience while elevating their own standing, Gartner Inc. says.

According to recent Parks Associates TV-viewing research, video consumption from on-demand sources continues to gain a larger segment of viewership, while live TV viewership is on the decline. As the landscape continues to transform through both consumer viewing habits and the growing variety of content sources such as live TV, over-the-top (OTT) and online, broadcasters are looking for ways to present unique, relevant offerings that can adapt to this dynamic market while also being cost-effective.

Sixty percent of crisis management leaders believe that organizations face more crises today than they did 10 years ago, according to a new survey from Deloitte. Organizations’ confidence in their crisis management capabilities often does not align with their actual level of preparedness, however.

As smart functionality makes its way into homes and businesses, two devices are gaining a foothold into broader ecosystems to maximize growth and revenue opportunities: smart speakers and smart meters. According to IHS Markit, by the end of 2021, there will be an installed base of 328 million smart speakers and more than 1.13 billion smart electricity, water and gas meters.

Consumer demand for OTT content and online video continues to increase, and content delivery network providers such as Akamai have developed solutions that ensure the highest quality and security for clients and their end user, according to Peter Chave, principal architect for Akamai, in a podcast interview with BizTechReports in which he discussed advances in online video fidelity and the horizon beyond quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM).

Consumer expenditures on experiential location-based virtual reality (LBVR) in shopping arcades, theme parks and movie theatres are expected to reach $809 million by 2022, according to a VR Tracker Report from Futuresource Consulting.  

The advent of 5G networks will enable communications service providers (CSPs) to secure future market opportunities with manufacturers of autonomous vehicles (AVs) in the fields of driver safety and data processing and management, according to new research from Gartner, Inc.

Despite high ambitions for the smart manufacturing sector, mobile service providers (MSPs), are currently secondary players in this market, according to a new forecast from ABI Research. Consequently, their short-term opportunity in manufacturing is forecast to be only $2.6 billion by 2022,

As U.S. consumers look to update their televisions, increasing the size and picture quality are the top driving force, according to a new report from NPD Group. Of the consumers who purchased a 4K/UHD replacement TV, 45 percent reported buying their new TV because they wanted a larger screen, 39 percent for better picture quality, and 24 percent purchased because pricing became more affordable.

As Google and Amazon jostle to position themselves as providers of the leading smart home voice control device, Futuresource Consulting noted in a recent report.  "Smart speakers led the field in terms of popularity and adoption, closely followed by climate control, which has become the most common first installation - slightly ahead of security, lighting and smart monitoring devices, such as smoke detectors," says Oliveira, Market Analyst at Futuresource Consulting.

The predominant uses of smart speakers revolve around asking questions, checking the weather, listening to news and playing music – not for controlling connected home devices, according to a new survey of consumers in the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, Germany and Brazil, conducted by IHS Markit.

Employee engagement has surfaced as a major concern in delivering improvements in customer experience (CX), with 86 percent of CX executives in a Gartner, Inc. survey ranking it as having an equal or greater impact than other factors such as project management and data skills.

New data from Juniper Research has revealed that the total number of connected Internet of Things (IoT) sensors and devices is set to exceed 50 billion by 2022, up from an estimated 21 billion in 2018.