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D2D via Satellite in the U.S.: Progress, Policy, and Commercial Viability

Alejandro Cadenas — Thu, 16 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Market Perspective discusses the emergence of direct-to-device (D2D) connectivity in the U.S. as a natural extension of the mobile network, enabled by advances in LEO constellations, 3GPP NTN standardization, and growing integration into consumer devices. Rather than acting as a standalone satellite service, D2D is being positioned as a complementary RAN layer focused on coverage and resilience, with early deployments centered on emergency communications, rural coverage extension, and low-bandwidth IoT use cases. While strong momentum is driven by partnerships between MNOs and satellite operators under frameworks such as the FCC's Supplemental Coverage from Space (SCS), the pace of adoption will depend on overcoming key constraints around device readiness, certification complexity, and limited satellite capacity. Over the next three to five years, D2D is expected to evolve from feature-based implementations to a network-native capability embedded within the broader 5G ecosystem.

"D2D in the U.S. should not be viewed as a new connectivity paradigm, but as the natural extension of the mobile network into areas where terrestrial economics break down," said Alejandro Cadenas, associate vice president of Telco Research, IDC. "Its success will depend less on satellite capacity and more on how effectively operators integrate spectrum, devices, and certification into a seamless hybrid experience."

IDC Market Glance: AI-Capable Devices, 2Q26

Tom Mainelli, Linn Huang, Ramon T. Llamas — Thu, 16 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Market Glance provides worldwide coverage of AI-capable personal computers, tablets, smartphones, and wearables, together with the enabling platform ecosystem elements defined in the analyst-approved structure, for 2Q26.

The AI-capable devices market includes end-user computing and connected devices that incorporate dedicated AI processing and/or AI-enabled software experiences to improve productivity, creativity, personalization, and automation. These capabilities are becoming an increasingly important factor in shaping device value, user engagement, and ecosystem differentiation across consumer and commercial segments.

Worldwide XR Headset Forecast, 2025-2030: CY 2Q26

Ramon T. Llamas — Mon, 13 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC presentation analyzes the future of the XR headset market, including augmented reality (AR), extended reality (EXR), mixed reality (MR), and virtual reality (VR) headsets, with shipments, average selling prices (ASPs), and value breakouts by region and usage segmentation.

“We have taken down our XR headset forecast following Meta’s decision to scale down its hardware. Considering its strong leadership position in the market, Meta’s actions now will have significant implications for the future. Moreover, the addition of new vendors to Android XR beyond Samsung has been slow, and Apple’s plans beyond its Vision Pro device — though updated — have yet to be announced. Meanwhile, multiple smaller vendors have been slowly gaining salience, addressing gamers, multimedia fans, and early adopters. All of this adds up to a decline in volumes in 2026 followed by a slow upward trajectory in 2027 and beyond.” — Ramon T. Llamas, research director, Mobile Devices and AR/VR at IDC

从中国未来"六张网"的建设挖掘数智化商机

Lianfeng Wu — Fri, 10 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT

本报告围绕2026年全国两会和国家发展改革委提出的"六张网"建设新部署，系统分析中国数智化市场由"企业内部数字化"迈向"产业与城市网络运行数智化"的新趋势。报告首先解读"六张网"，即水网、电网、算力网、新型通信网、城市地下管网、物流网的政策来源、投资逻辑与建设节奏，其次分析六张网建设如何重构数智化市场的价值重心、竞争规则和厂商卡位方式，并分别梳理每张网对应的重点建设方向、关键数智化场景与适配厂商能力。在此基础上，报告进一步总结六张网带来的综合商机，研判未来三年市场演进路径，并提出数智化厂商从卖产品走向占位置、从项目交付走向长期运营的战略建议。

IDC中国副总裁兼首席分析师武连峰表示："中国未来'六张网'建设，正在把数智化市场从传统的数字化补课阶段，推进到国家关键网络协同重构的新阶段。未来厂商竞争的关键，不再只是单一产品能力，而是谁能够围绕水、电、算、数、城、物流等关键网络，形成可调度、可治理、可运营、可持续演进的综合能力。谁能够率先完成从解决方案供应商向网络运行能力共建者的转身，谁就更有机会在未来五年的中国数智化市场中建立新的增长曲线。"

IDC Market Glance: Embedded Finance, 1Q26

Jordan Steele — Tue, 07 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT

The IDC Market Glance visually depicts a concise current-state view of the embedded finance ecosystem. It is a taxonomy document that defines the market's major segments and subsegments and highlights representative vendors to help technology suppliers and services providers assess competitive positioning, adjacency, and partnership opportunities.

Agentic Commerce Reality and the Last Mile of Human Customer Experiences

Mon, 06 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Perspective discusses the importance of agentic commerce. Agentic commerce is beginning to reshape the buyer journey, but in uneven and uncomfortable ways: discovery is rapidly shifting to intent-driven, zero‑click, and agent‑curated results; experiences are becoming highly personalized yet less brand led; transactions are faster but leave accountability murky; fulfillment is quietly optimized rather than reinvented; and post‑purchase may end up as the last real arena for human-differentiated customer experience.

"Agentic commerce is often marketed as a simple story of the inevitability of smarter AI. That's far from true. This is a business soap opera about the dynamics of power, profit, and control," says Heather Hershey, research director of AI-Enabled Digital Commerce at IDC. "The progression of agentic commerce will be asymmetrical across various regions and domains. The result: the need for complex, new operational, and narrative strategies that appeal to humans and agentic AI interfaces concurrently."

Google's Gemma 4 Brings On-Device AI into the Multimodel Architecture Conversation

Arnal Dayaratna — Mon, 06 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Google's Gemma 4 extends open-weight AI further into the practical deployment environments where software is built and used. The family spans mobile, browser, desktop, wearable, and edge scenarios through smaller E2B and E4B variants and the LiteRT-LM runtime, while larger models are available on Google Cloud through Vertex AI and Google Kubernetes Engine. Multimodal and multistep AI behavior is becoming more portable across execution surfaces that were previously constrained by model size, latency, and hardware limits. Google is treating Gemma 4 less as a side release for the open model community and more as a distributed deployment layer spanning edge and cloud environments simultaneously.

Physical AI: Engineering Services Enabling the Next Industrial Revolution

Abhishek Mukherjee, Mukesh Dialani — Tue, 31 Mar 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Physical AI is transforming industrial operations by embedding advanced AI into physical assets, enabling autonomous, intelligent action in complex environments. This shift drives productivity, safety, and resilience across sectors, but success depends on deep domain expertise, robust integration, and disciplined engineering. Engineering service providers are critical in bridging technical gaps, orchestrating technology, and ensuring sustainable, enterprisewide deployment, positioning physical AI as a core driver of competitive advantage in the next industrial revolution.

"Physical AI is not just automating tasks; it is redefining the boundaries of what machines and humans can achieve together. As advanced intelligence is embedded into the very fabric of industrial assets, the next industrial revolution will be won by those who master the art of seamless integration, resilient engineering, and human-machine collaboration. The future belongs to enterprises bold enough to bridge the execution gap and turn complexity into competitive advantage." — Abhishek Mukherjee, research manager, Digital Engineering and Operational Technology Services, IDC

Top 5 CPaaS Trends for 2026

Courtney Munroe, Melissa Holtz-Fremeijer — Tue, 31 Mar 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Perspective explores the top 5 CPaaS trends in 2026, which will be an amazing year for CPaaS platforms. Most companies are implementing sophisticated agentic AI orchestration, along with the provisioning of important new channels such as RCS and voice capabilities. However, ease of use and security are also important; enterprises are buying assurance as much as capability.

According to Courtney Munroe, research vice president, Worldwide Telecommunications Research, IDC, "Platforms that minimize operational ambiguity, abstract regulatory complexity, and demonstrate consistent execution enable internal teams to focus on business outcomes rather than platform risk." Vendors that fail to meet this bar are increasingly filtered out early in enterprise procurement cycles regardless of price or feature claims.

Retailers Move Toward Unified Decisioning at NRF

Ananda Chakravarty — Fri, 27 Mar 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Perspective discusses how merchandising remains critical as retailers shift from agentic AI hype to practical, real-world application across stores, online, back offices, and distribution. At NRF 2026, the focus moved from point solutions to unified decision-making powered by integrated data, processes, and systems. Retailers are adopting holistic, systems-based approaches by combining AI/ML and modular capabilities to optimize operations and drive end-to-end outcomes.

"Retailers want their inventory data to correspond to pricing and to their financial planning, supply chain, and even online order management. To accomplish this, data and merchandising must become unified, not just in terms of a single source of data but a propagation of decisions across all aspects of the business — that's unified decision-making," says Ananda "Andy" Chakravarty, research vice president, IDC Retail Insights.