Indeed, mobile phone users are getting younger and younger -- and operators, content providers and device manufacturers are starting to address the potential of the teen/tween/children's markets more directly. In the US market in particular, two industry strategies are noteworthy: developing devices for kids that appeal to parents as purchasers, and marketing of phones more directly to the youth market.

The three main children's mobiles out at the moment are the Firefly, LG Migo and the TicTalk from Enfora, marketed by LeapFrog. Recent data from Complete shows that these models for younger users are getting a good bit of attention from parents looking to equip their pre-teens with some basic form of communication device. Key drivers in this part of the market are probably a desire for security and ability to know the whereabouts of children. These factors are themselves driven by growing independence of the younger set and the emergence of new technology-driven communication patterns among families created by the rise of IM, push-to-talk, and growing popularity of family mobile tariff plans. They will no doubt be carried for some time both by their novelty factor and operator marketing.

Operators are now seeing they need to market directly to teens as other segments get saturated. This strategy also helps make use of the prepay investments operators have made as well. The newest wave of US MVNOs almost entirely aim at the youth segment through branding, content and device design. The wave of finely tuned teen-directed marketing will no doubt continue from US operators as they see revenue opportunities in content, messaging, and airtime coming from this active group of consumers.

Where next? Some fingers point to the new generation of portable gaming devices such as the PSP and Nintendo DS, both capable of wireless access, as ripe targets for wireless services development, perhaps led by something other than voice revenue. A long-rumored iPod with wireless access would help grow the attractiveness of this segment as well. 10-year olds of 2006 will be more accustomed to applications like VoIP, networked game devices and rich communication by the time they are in their mid-teens. The youth market could be one that really changes the face of what we now view as the mobile industry.