The behavior of these consumers has been thoroughly analyzed by Ericsson's unit for consumer insight and segmentation, ConsumerLab.

So who are they? To the digital native, the internet, mobility and related technologies have always been available. Networked media and communication is the foundation of their lives. They are used to the immediacy of hypertext, downloaded music, phones in their pockets that are on 24-7 and a library of content on their laptops and computers. They've been networked most or all of their lives.

Niclas Medman, manager, Ericsson Multimedia Solutions Marketing, says: “Being always connected is natural to them. They are constantly interacting with their social networks and expect all content and services to be available at all times.”

Digital natives also blur the boundaries between work and their private lives. As these experienced multimedia users now start their careers, they expect to have communication and consumption tools available constantly during their free time as well as in their work.

The first digital natives are now in their early 20s and have, typically, already sent and received 250,000 e-mails, instant messages, and text messages, used a mobile phone for 10,000 hours, played video games for 5000 hours and spent 3500 hours social networking online.

The ConsumerLab Global Consumer Segmentation Model and vast knowledge of the different types of consumers have now been used to visualize the needs of digital natives by creating a “person”, Jessica. She is a London teenager with 223 friends online and, as soon as she wakes up, she checks her phone to find out who else is online. For Jessica it is all about the experience and being in control of her situation. Services should be accessible anywhere, anytime and from any device. She loves music and uses mobile music services such as Napster Mobile. She also uses mobile-TV services to check what's in fashion and to vote for her favorite artist, Wei Wei, on award shows.

To understand what her needs are and how a service provider can satisfy them, you can meet Jessica at the Ericsson stand during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on February 11-14.

For service providers in the multimedia market, there will be two major consequences as these consumers now grow up and join the workforce: a high demand for multimedia services from a group willing and able to spend more on these services, as well as a demand for tools to support the group's advanced way of communicating - both in their free time and at their workplace.

The need to adjust is illustrated by The Global Multimedia Report - Great future ahead for consumer and enterprise multimedia, a survey by analyst firm IDC which showed that 79 percent of young consumers use communities and 52 percent are actively adding content - while only 30 percent of IT managers in the survey use communities in their private lives.

Eva Windisch, strategic marketing manager, Ericsson Multimedia, says: “Not only do IT managers need to wake up, but service providers that can give digital natives the right tools and services to boost their productivity at work, and allow their spare-time communications creativity to flourish, will gain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. Because make no mistake about it: the digital natives represent a major shift in user behavior.”