BBM set to cannibalise text messaging for 15-24 year-olds

Consultancy Mobile Youth sees instant messaging hitting operator SMS revenues in next two years.

The number of texts sent by 15-24 year-olds will fall by 20% in regions including the UK, Indonesia, South Africa and Brazil according to a new report from consultancy Mobile Youth.

The cause? BBM and other instant messaging apps, according to the Financial Times. "We’ve seen SMS usage fall among young people and the main driver is BlackBerry," Mobile Youth director Graham Brown tells the newspaper.

The report also highlights the growth of Facebook and Twitter as reasons for young people to text less, although as it points out, those services' mobile apps require data contracts to be used, so operators aren't necessarily losing out.

BBM is hugely popular among younger mobile users, although it's facing new competition from cross-platform apps like Kik Messenger and WhatsApp Messenger, which work on a range of smartphones.