Section
Technologies
Connected devices, headsets, networks, cloud, and how to read a forecast.
Nobody independent counts connected devices, headset shipments or cloud market shares. Every headline figure in this section is a commercial analyst estimate, including the ones treated as authoritative, and that is stated each time. The section also keeps a record of specific forecasts made with dates attached, checked against what actually happened. For a practical example of software used to turn activity into operational metrics, see employee attendance tracking software.
Nearly every headline number here is a commercial analyst estimate, including the credible ones.
| Article | Findings | Strong / mixed / weak |
|---|---|---|
| 5G and getting online The measured story of 5G is capacity growing faster than anyone uses it, while 2.2 billion people remain offline for reasons that have little to do with coverage. |
6 | |
| The cloud and who runs it British regulators have measured cloud concentration in detail; nobody measures aggregate downtime, the cost of outages or how much water data centres use. |
7 | |
| How to read a technology forecast The three most-quoted technology forecasts of the last fifteen years all came from firms selling into the market they sized, and none published a method. |
7 | |
| Connected devices and the smart home Nobody independent counts connected devices, and the household survey data that does exist shows the smart home is mostly televisions and speakers. |
6 | |
| Virtual and augmented reality The strongest numbers in virtual reality are the losses and the clinical trials; the shipment forecasts and adoption claims come from vendor-funded trackers. |
7 |
5G and getting online
UK mobile speeds rose 30% in a year while data use rose 10%, and 5G still carries 28% of traffic. Supply is outrunning demand, and coverage tracks income.
6 sourced findings · 1274 words · updated 2026-08-09
The cloud and who runs it
Two firms each hold 30-40% of UK cloud supply, two 2025 outages took out large parts of the web, and data centres used about 1.5% of world electricity.
7 sourced findings · 1303 words · updated 2026-08-09
How to read a technology forecast
Cisco forecast 50 billion connected devices by 2020 and the count reached 21.1 billion in 2025. Three documented misses and what they have in common.
7 sourced findings · 1304 words · updated 2026-08-09
Connected devices and the smart home
Every global count of connected devices is a commercial estimate, and the best current one reached 21.1 billion in 2025, well under half Cisco's forecast.
6 sourced findings · 1301 words · updated 2026-08-09
Virtual and augmented reality
Meta's Reality Labs lost $19.2bn on $2.2bn of revenue in 2025, no independent body counts headsets, and the clinical evidence is better than the market.
7 sourced findings · 1290 words · updated 2026-08-09