Worldwide mobile connections to
reach 3 Billion in 2007
Ramon Barquin III
Computers & Business World News
Washington,DC
In many
parts of the world, cell phone penetration is already over 100%.
And still the market is growing.
According to the latest figures from
Wireless Intelligence
(WI), having passed 2.5 billion in September 2006, the number of
cellular connections will reach three billion before the end of
2007.
Over
400 million additional connections will be made this year, for
an annual market growth rate of 15%.
WI
analysts expect that the majority of the growth will continue to
come from the Asia-Pacific region, which is expected to add up
to more than 1.2 billion connections and account for 40% of the
world's cellular growth for the year.
The
fastest rate of growth in the region will shift from China to
India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Overall,
world market penetration will rise from an estimated 41% at the
end of 2006 to 47% by the end of 2007.
WI analysts stress, though, that this does not mean that nearly
half of the world's population will own cellular phones. The
disconnect in the numbers is due to two things: the fact that
SIMs are no longer used because of churn, and multiple device
ownership.
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