3GPP Technologies Add 90% of New Wireless

Connections in the Americas

June 03 2011

BELLEVUE, Wash. –  The 3GPP family of technologies continues to lead the mobile wireless industry in the Americas comprising 90 percent of all new connections or 82.1 million new subscriptions of the net total of 91.1 million subscriptions added in the region the 12 months ending March 2011, reports 4G Americas, based on subscription data from Informa Telecoms & Media. Mobile broadband connections continued to soar, particularly in North America, where 535,000 new LTE connections and an additional 6.5 million UMTS-HSPA subscriptions were added in the first quarter 2011 alone.

“GSM-UMTS-LTE was the fastest-growing mobile technology family in the Americas in the year ending 1Q 2011, with subscriptions up 13 percent to 698 million,” said Mike Roberts, Principal Analyst & Head of Americas at Informa Telecoms & Media. “In addition, 1Q 2011 was a milestone quarter for LTE in North America, where the technology broke through the half-a-million barrier to end 1Q 2011 with 610,000 subscriptions.”

At the end of 1Q 2011, the 3GPP family of technologies in North, Central and South America realized:

• 80 HSPA mobile broadband networks in 29 countries — up from 77 HSPA networks in 29 countries at the end of 2010; including 20 HSPA+ networks in 7 countries
• 2 LTE networks in the U.S., with an additional 9 LTE networks expected in the U.S. and one each in Canada and Latin America by the end of 2011
• 13.4 million new UMTS-HSPA subscriptions added in 1Q 2011 to reach nearly 133 million

LATIN AMERICA

Annual growth of GSM-HSPA mobile connections in the Latin America and Caribbean region reached 27 percent, adding 67 million new connections year-over-year at the end of March 2011. Of the 67 million new connections in the region, 26.5 million — more than one-third — of all new connections were UMTS-HSPA mobile broadband. By the end of 1Q 2011, the growing trend toward UMTS-HSPA mobile broadband represented nearly two-thirds of all new connections; GSM added 9.2 million connections in the first quarter while UMTS-HSPA added 6.9 million new connections.

“Data demand continues to explode in Latin America; by the end of 2010, the data contribution to ARPU reached an average of more than 21 percent with countries like Argentina exhibiting a strong 36 percent of ARPU on data services,” commented Erasmo Rojas, Director of Latin America and the Caribbean at 4G Americas. “Additionally, mobile Internet connectivity was already the preferred access by the end of 2010 in countries such as Brazil with 21 million mobile broadband versus 14 million fixed broadband accesses and in Uruguay with 54 percent mobile broadband versus 46 percent fixed mobile broadband accesses.”

Rojas added, “On top of that, the arrival of new smartphones and tablets powered by different operating systems continue to increase data consumption, which requires an accelerated network upgrade by the different operators in spite of the current spectrum crunch and the effort of the regulators to bring more spectrum to the market in a timely manner for the benefit of the consumers.”   

NORTH AMERICA

At the end of March 2011, the U.S. and Canada had a total of 150 million 3GPP technology connections including 82.3 million UMTS-HSPA connections, an additional 610,000 LTE connections and 67 million GSM connections. The North American region is leading the industry in mobile broadband adoption as customers upgrade to HSPA and LTE.

Chris Pearson, President of 4G Americas, commented, “3GPP mobile broadband technologies continue to provide a winning experience for customers who expect high speed wireless data service anywhere and at any time. As smartphones become more powerful and data dongles become more prevalent, there is a continued insatiable demand for mobile broadband.”

GLOBAL

GSM-HSPA technologies reached 4.9 billion of the world’s 5.5 billion mobile subscriptions or 90 percent market share at the end of 1Q 2011. At the end of March 2011, there were nearly 692 million UMTS-HSPA subscriptions and an additional 653,000 LTE subscriptions, representing nearly 13 percent of the 3GPP family technology market, on more than 400 commercial mobile broadband networks worldwide. Today, 141 operators in 73 countries have upgraded their networks to HSPA+ and 4G Americas expects most HSPA networks will be upgraded; 22 operators in 16 countries have deployed LTE to date.

HSPA will remain the leading mobile broadband technology well into the future. Informa forecasts that there will be 1 billion UMTS-HSPA subscriptions worldwide by year-end 2011 and this number will nearly double in two years’ time reaching nearly 2 billion connections at the end of 2013.

For more information and to view a variety of statistical charts on the GSM family of technologies, visit www.4gamericas.org.

About 4G Americas: Unifying the Americas through Mobile Broadband Technology

 
4G Americas is an industry trade organization composed of leading telecommunications service providers and manufacturers. The organization’s mission is to promote, facilitate and advocate for the deployment and adoption of the 3GPP family of technologies throughout the Americas. 4G Americas contributes to the successful commercial rollout of 3GPP mobile broadband technologies across the Americas and their place as the No. 1 technology family in the region. The organization aims to develop the expansive wireless ecosystem of networks, devices, and applications enabled by GSM and its evolution to LTE. 4G Americas is headquartered in Bellevue, Wash., with an office for Latin America and the Caribbean in Dallas. More information is available at www.4gamericas.org.

4G Americas’ Board of Governors members include: Alcatel-Lucent, América Móvil, AT&T, Cable & Wireless, CommScope, Ericsson, Gemalto, HP, Huawei, Nokia Siemens Networks, Openwave, Powerwave, Qualcomm, Research In Motion (RIM), Rogers, Shaw Communications, T-Mobile USA and Telefónica.

About Informa Telecoms & Media

Informa Telecoms & Media (ITM; www.informatm.com) conducts primary and secondary research on the latest trends impacting the mobile communications, fixed communications and TV sectors, on a global basis. ITM’s market intelligence services – World Cellular Information Service (WCIS), World Broadband Information Service (WBIS) and the Intelligence Centre – give clients access to market forecasts and key performance indicators (KPIs), as well as detailed analysis and exploration of trends. These comprehensive and reliable data sources combined with access to a team of dedicated analysts provide clients with essential business tools to assist in their strategic and tactical decision making processes. ITM also organizes over 100 annual events bringing together the industry’s leading decision makers.