Pakistan continues to lead the world in mobile phone growth rate and China continues to lead in absolute number of subscribers added per month, but Indian's mobile sector is going great guns putting India close to China in absolute adds and #3 for percentage growth.
This update from Mobile Pundit caused me to do a quick check-in on some of my favorite emerging telecom markets. Computing growth by comparing the most recent figures I could get (June or July 2006) with subscriber numbers from 3Q05, here are the current figures:
| Millions of Mobile Subs |
Mobile Teledensity |
Growth Rate | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pakistan | 34.5 | 20.8 | 278% |
| Bangladesh | 11.6 | 7.9 | 211% |
| India | 108.0 | 9.9 | 202% |
| Nigeria | 24.0 | 18.2 | 192% |
| China | 426.4 | 32.5 | 158% |
I've included Nigeria as it's the fastest growing telecom market in Africa. As a continent Africa lags Asia, but it's a fascinating place, both for problems and opportunities. And of course, our AccessGate RAN optimizer is being widely adopted in Africa, so I'm paying more attention.
While Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and Nigeria are all stuck with relatively small and slowly growing fixed line networks, China is different with a large "fixed line" network undergoing significant growth.
| Millions of Mobile Subs |
Mobile Teledensity |
Growth Rate | |
|---|---|---|---|
| China -fixed | 365.3 | 27.8 | 78% |
Some are these are actually fixed, some are WLL, e.g. the PAS or Little Smart system. In any event that gives China a total of 792 million telecom subscribers and a total teledensity of 60.3, way ahead of other emerging markets.
Here's the rest of the data if you're interested. Download mobile_teledensity_growth_as_of_mid2006.xls
I continue to be dismayed by bureaucracy in India, censorship in China and Pakistan, and corruption everywhere, but especially in Bangladesh, Nigeria and Pakistan. But these numbers give me hope. Telecom directly drives economic growth and diverse communication channels are the best antidote for closed societies. It may take decades, but substantial parts of the world are headed in the right direction.
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