The Cloud’s New Year’s public WiFi usage figures highlight continued tablet boom in UK

The Cloud’s New Year’s usage figures highlight continued tablet boom with 300% increase in Android tablets between Jan 2013 and 2014

St Albans, UK, 27-1-2014 — /EuropaWire/ — The Cloud, the UK’s leading public WiFi hotspot provider, has today released figures which explore the UK’s obsession with all things mobile – highlighting the increasing popularity of tablet devices and the reliance on mobile internet throughout the festive period and into the New Year.

The Cloud saw a 114% increase in tablet devices accessing the WiFi network on January 8th 2014, compared with the same day in 2013. This date was chosen for analysis because the majority of UK is back at work and new devices have been registered. Reflecting the growing popularity of devices such as the Nexus 7 and Kindle Fire, The Cloud also saw a 307% increase in Android tablets accessing the network compared with the previous year. iOS tablets also increased but by a significantly lower 106%.

The retail-frenzy during Christmas and New Year is a notoriously busy time for The Cloud which provides internet connection in venues such as Westfield, M&S and WH Smiths. 2013 was no different, with over 8.4 million WiFi sessions connecting between December 27 and December 31, 2013 – a 3.5 times increaseon the 2.4 million sessions during this period in 2012. Not surprisingly, the venues seeing the heaviest usage during this period were the shopping malls.

Vince Russell, Managing Director, The Cloud, said: “What’s stood out in the first few weeks of 2014 is the rise in Android tablets using our WiFi compared with this time last year. To us this highlights the rise of the tablet industry which was once all about the iPad, but other devices have now made their mark. The figures also show how we are becoming more tablet-obsessed as a nation. Since the start of 2014, the UK has spent over 39 million tablet-based minutes online. With everything from online banking to retail and healthcare being increasingly tablet-based, we expect usage to grow even more over the next 12 months.”

The Cloud saw extensive growth during 2013 and now offers free WiFi in over 20,000 locations across the UK, with 8 million registered users.

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Press contact details:
The Cloud
Lorna Hughes
Harvard PR
020 7861 2800
TheCloud@harvard.co.uk

About The Cloud 
• The Cloud (www.thecloud.co.uk) builds and operates Wi-Fi networks across the UK and Europe to provide the mobile media experience that consumers want. The service delivers simple, fast and cost effective broadband to millions of Wi-Fi enabled smartphones, laptops and entertainment devices. The Cloud has exclusive commercial partnerships with retail, leisure, hotels, sports, transport, and entertainment and content partners to deliver its longer-term vision of a connected society.

• The Cloud has over 8 million registered users connecting for over 1.8 billion minutes a month at over 20,000 live locations such as the Silverstone Race Track, the City of London, Wetherspoon, PizzaExpress, Caffe Nero, Eat, pubs, leisure facilities, restaurants and mainline stations.

• Approximately 8 million people pass through The Cloud network everyday by visiting one of its partners, including major outlets such as WHSmith, PizzaExpress, Greggs, Pret and Wagamama, as well as First Great Western and Network Rail stations.

• The Cloud is a BSkyB Company.