Five billion people in the world use mobile phones, 436 million in sub-Sahara Africa – GSMA
The number of mobile phone subscribers in the world has reached five billion, according to the research arm of the global mobile industry organization, GSMA. But sub-Sahara Africa is the least penetrated with 436 million unique subscribers, the organization says in a press release copied to ghanabusinessnews.com.
The GSMA defines a ‘unique mobile subscriber’ as an individual person that can account for multiple ‘mobile connections’, that is SIM cards.
According to GSMA Intelligence, the world’s five billion unique mobile subscribers today account for approximately 7.7 billion mobile connections – excluding mobile-to-mobile (M2M).
“The five billion milestone means that more than two-thirds of the global population is now connected to a mobile service. It has taken four years to add the latest one billion subscribers,” it said.
Commenting, Mats Granryd, the Director General of the GSMA said, “Reaching the five billion subscriber milestone is a tremendous achievement for an industry that is only a few decades old, and reflects the many billions of dollars that mobile operators have invested in networks, services and spectrum over many years.”
“Today mobile is a truly global platform, delivering connectivity and, perhaps more importantly, social and economic opportunities to citizens in all corners of the world. This massive reach allows the mobile industry to be a key player in delivering global initiatives such as the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals1,” he added.
The release indicates that more than half, that is 55 per cent of mobile subscribers are based in the Asia Pacific region, which is home to the world’s two largest mobile markets: China and India.
“China accounts for more than a billion of the world’s subscribers, while India accounts for 730 million,” it said.
The most highly penetrated region in the world is Europe, where 86 per cent of citizens are subscribed to a mobile service. Sub-Saharan Africa is the least penetrated region at 44 per cent, the release added.
GSMA Intelligence tracks the number of unique mobile subscribers worldwide in real time at www.gsmaintelligence.com.
“This number is calculated using GSMA Intelligence’s extensive database of mobile statistics and forecasts, which comprises tens of millions of individual data points, updated daily,” it said.
GSMA Intelligence monitors in real time, as mobile phone companies around the world add to their list of subscribers.
By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi
Copyright ©2017 by Creative Imaginations Publicity
All rights reserved. This news item or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in reviews.