One surefire way to predict the hottest industries of the future is to look at where businesses are hiring now.
Using that logic, we are on the precipice of an explosion of 3D-printing-related Android mobile-phone applications. That’s according to an analysis of over 270,000 contract, part-time positions listed on the job website Freelancer.com.
In the first quarter of 2014, the number of Android developer jobs listed on Freelancer.com topped the number of iPhone developer jobs. While iPhones are still exceptionally popular in the developed world, devices that run Google's Android platform “are growing like wildfire" in the developing world, the report says. Lower-cost Apple iPhones were an attempt to combat this competition, though they have largely been met with lukewarm response.
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Android developer jobs first outpaced iPhone developer jobs midway through last year and the trend has not slowed down. In the first three months of 2014, there were 11,141 Android developer jobs listed on Freelancer.com. That’s a 34 percent increase from the previous quarter. Meanwhile, the number of iPhone jobs listed on Freelancer.com in the first quarter was 10,207, up 32 percent from the quarter prior.
Another major driver in Internet-related jobs posted on Freelancer.com in the first quarter of 2014 was 3-D printing. The number of 3-D rendering jobs listed on the platform was 2,784, a 44 percent surge from the previous quarter. 3-D animation jobs and 3-D modeling jobs jumped 36 percent and 35 percent, respectively, during the same time.
As 3-D printers get less expensive and become an integral part of entrepreneurs' prototyping process, the hope is that they'll soon be on the desks and in the homes of individual consumers. “Tech retailers are salivating at the thought of affordable 3-D printers under Christmas trees when the 2014 Holiday season arrives,” the Freelancer.com report says.
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The third trend Freelancer.com sited was mobile phone jobs, which numbered 13,340 in the first three months of 2014, a more than 35 percent gain from the prior quarter. The already hot mobile phone industry was given an extra boost with the viral success of mobile games like Candy Crush and Flappy Bird. King.com, the maker of the addictive smartphone game Candy Crush, just went public last month, though its performance has been rocky.
Also hot in the first quarter of this year were jobs to support content marketing, or advertising by attracting potential consumers with interesting information related to a particular topic. Ghostwriting jobs surged almost 42 percent and copywriting jobs jumped 18 percent, the report said.
Finally, as businesses seek to outsource organizational and operational tasks so that full-time employees can focus on core tasks, there has been an increase in demand for freelance accountants, sales professionals, business analysts and virtual assistants. Accounting jobs on Freelance.com jumped 27 percent in the first quarter of 2014 while virtual assistant jobs rose by 13 percent and sales jobs rose almost 21 percent.
The full report on Internet-related jobs posted on Freelancer.com can be found here.
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