The head of the UN agency for information and communication technologies has gazed deep into his crystal ball and predicted that there will be 4 billion mobile phone users by the end of this year - which equals more than half of the planets estimated 6.7 billion inhabitants.

Speaking at the UN’s session on the Millennium Development Goals in New York, Hamadoun Touré, secretary general of the International Telecom Union (ITU), said that growth had been driven by consumers in developing markets such as China, India and Latin America.

The whole world has gone mobile crazy over the last eight years, notching up average year-on-year subscriber growth of 24%. In 2000, just 12% of the world’s population had a mobile phone, but that figure has already soared past 50% and is on track to hit 61% by the end of 2008.

Plummeting handset prices and ropey land lines have made mobile communications all the more attractive to consumers in developing countries and markets.



News Origin :
http://digital-lifestyles.info

Back