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Spending on mobile music is on track to hit $11 billion and account for 30 percent of worldwide-recorded music revenue by 2011, projects Understanding & Solutions.

Mobile music currently accounts for 13 percent of global recorded music revenue. "Alongside online, mobile music is essential to the future of the music industry," says Understanding & Solutions Consultant, David Sidebottom.

"Japan, closely followed by the USA, has the most efficient mobile music landscape: both countries have a concentrated operator base and a large pool of potential subscribers, providing economies of scale for the music companies."

In the fragmented European market, some operators have become less aggressive because they can't make money directly from selling full track downloads, but that opens the door for third party service providers.

"Looking to emerging markets, mobile could become the number one platform for
music, where packaged CDs haven't gained traction due to piracy and lack of hardware ownership," said Sidebottom.

"Both China and India are showing large revenue gains, which are being driven by strong mobile subscriber growth and the status associated with music-related personalized mobile products."